The unPrized Uchiha
by princesshyuuga01
Summary: If there was ever something formidable enough to make Uchiha Sasuke cower in fear, it would be his child's likeness to his former self. Deflecting in order to seek power was hereditary it would seem... [Short Story; Five parts only. Inclusive of Epilogue]
1. History Speaks

**"Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them."**

— **James Baldwin**

"There you go," Sasuke said as he woodenly poured hot chocolate—as rich as it was dark—in a mug and stepped back to watch his worst critic's reaction.

It flowed slowly as she swirled the mug until the top became a whirlpool of white milk foam that was spotted with cocoa powder.

He knew the bottom was a mass of sugar crystals that had reformed as it cooled—knew that the warm liquid would coat her tongue thickly before flowing down her throat.

Just the way she liked it, he could only hope.

He held his breath, willing her to try it. He was damn near out of chocolate and this was his sixth attempt.

The cup rose deliberately slow to her lips and he watched her little porcelain face, his eyes wide with unknowing entreaty. She held his gaze and oddly enough, the pulse-beat at the base of his throat throbbed erratically.

Those brown eyes.

They were more than chocolate and honey.

They were the rocks against the shore that wrecked ships. They were copper against honey and when they watered—as they did earlier—they glowed like two perfect orbs, the same shade as nature after it rained. They were the rich dirt of Konoha and sunlight shining through whiskey.

They could melt you with their facade of chocolate, but then they would crush you with their under-layer of earth and soil.

Those brown eyes.

Beautiful. Dangerous. Deadly.

They were torture.

"Can I have some more cream?" she suddenly asked, raising her head from the cup to flicker her tongue out and lick away the cream off the roof of her lips.

Faint colour touching his slanting cheekbones, Sasuke added a generous layer, topping it with a zigzag of chocolate sauce. He didn't know why he was even making an effort to be creative. After all, she deserved to go to bed without supper for her rotten behaviour.

"Arigato," she said. There was warmth in her voice—a smile, even.

Annoyed, Sasuke kept staring at her. She was very hard to please—very irritating. He wasn't sure he liked her very much and yet, he would do anything to guarantee her happiness.

Why?

Because Uchiha Reika was the splitting image of her mother—minus the hair buns and perhaps the golden tanned skin—she was as pale and temperamental as he was. Her profile was a delight. Long lashes veiling those big brown eyes, neat nose just slightly pinched around the nostrils and naturally rosy cheeks. She was the picture of perfection—

His heart swelled until he thought it might burst out of his chest.

—the picture of Tenten.

Still, she was nothing like her mother. In spite of her diminutive size Tenten had a big heart, so unused to hurting anyone she was swift to apologize when she felt she had. Her daughter on the other hand had a loose tongue and a heart equally as black as the eyes of the man who fathered her.

Sasuke's dealt her a chilling glance.

He wasn't exactly the greatest of cook but the least the brat could've done was be a bit more sympathetic to their situation, rather than throw tantrums and cry for _mommy_. Now he was forced to resort to serving her hot chocolate and a slice of her brother's birthday cake for dinner because she refused to eat what was initially prepared.

To be fair to her, the hashed beef stew as too salty and the beef and onions that were supposed to have been thinly sliced weren't exactly thin. He wasn't even sure it had actually been beef either.

The baby, it seemed, was handling Tenten's absence far better than either of them. He had taken his bottle—without protest or complaint—and drank quietly in his highchair. If something tasted off with his formula—Sasuke was certain something must've—Uchito hadn't indicated.

"You promised to brush my hair before bed," Reika pouted, twirling a long strand of hair around her finger.

It was a soft brown, like the bark of an oak tree, not dark but simply gentle in any light with hues of red and gold—the colour of fallen leaves browned and sleek with the first rain of autumn.

Sasuke's back stiffened.

He could not recall having committed himself to such a horrendous and beneath-him task. Besides, looking at the child's hair now, he knew he could never get a comb through it without a gallon of conditioner—a testament of how neglected her hair had been since Tenten left, three weeks ago.

His face twisted into grimace as he imagined the comb mercilessly yanking on Reika's hair until she screamed bloody murder. Its fine teeth would get tangled in those messy curls; they would lap and devour them like a nest of brown mambas.

She hadn't gotten her hair texture from Tenten that was for sure.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. "You're five years old, you should be able to do that yourself," he chided, in an attempt to be relieved of the responsibility.

But the fish didn't take the bait. Reika instead took a long and noisly sip of her drink and pinned him with pleading eyes. "Mommy always did it for me."

"Well I'm not your mother, am I?" he rasped.

Her chin lifted at that particular tone. "I miss her daddy. When is she coming back?"

Sasuke pulled Uchito's highchair next to his own chair and ruffled his hair. "If she's not back in three days, I'm going for her myself," he promised, poking his little nose.

The baby seemed to bounce about and whack his empty bottle against his chair in approval. When it fell to the floor he scrunched up his face as if to start howling but Sasuke held up an admonishing finger.

"I don't like crying," he stroked the tot's peachy cheeks and was rewarded by two chubby little arms stealing around his neck. "I don't like hugging either."

Uchito opened his mouth over the corner of Sasuke's and drooled all over his chin and jaw. It was his version of kissing—sloppy, wet, and somewhat cringe-worthy, yet it turned Sasuke's heart over.

"What makes you think I like having you slobber all over me either?" he chuckled and drew back, tracing Uchito's button nose, the squidgy little lips, the putty chin. "I wish you and your mother would just keep your mouths to yourselves."

He giggled.

He was more like Tenten than his appearance let on and Sasuke was probably a bad parent for admitting it, but he was his favourite child. He might be the exact replica of the Uchiha avenger—down to the birth marks on both their left shoulders—but Uchito was always so pleasant and brimming with energy that he was a constant reminder of his mother.

Reika on the other hand was a demoness. Ditch the brown hair for black, add some purple eye-shadow and she might even past for one of Orochimaru's reincarnations.

Sasuke did not like that he saw so much of his former self in her. If there was ever an enemy formidable enough to make him cower in fear it would probably be his daughter and her likeness to his younger power-hungry self. It was a nightmare. She was already asking questions about Madara, Itachi, Obito and all the other Uchihas who deflected.

"I love ew daddy," Uchito chirped, then he was off chattering in that unintelligible babble that he liked to use.

"Mommy is going to be so mad when she finds out you've been feeding me cake and ice-cream for dinner," Reika revealed grimly, somewhat vindictive.

"Quit complaining, most kids your age would kill for that," he told her. "Besides—" he slipped a piece of cake into Uchito's mouth. "—you won't breathe a word of this or I'll tell her what really happened to those scrolls," he threatened.

Her eyes widened at that, her soft mouth dropping open. Despite her age, she understood the concept of blackmail. It was the language her father spoke when he wanted to get her to do or not do something.

"It's because you keep ruining dinner, isn't it—?" she asked coldly, staring at the forceful set of his jaw, those mesmerizingly beautiful black eyes she wished she owned a pair of, the harsh slant of his cheekbones and the way his mouth was clamped in irritation.

He looked menacing.

"—and breakfast and lunch, and anything else that has to be prepared in the kit—" she added with reproof.

A slashing movement of one lean, long-fingered hand effectively silenced her.

"Eave daddy lone!" Uchito scowled, he too waving his hands angrily.

Sasuke smoothed his hair in an attempt to calm him down. He was Sasuke's protector, always quick to fight with his sister when she was being mean to daddy.

"Yes, leave me alone, Reika," he said laughingly in agreement.

She folded her arms and shot him a look of withering contempt. "Next time mommy leaves I'm staying with Uncle Neji."

He fell into an appalled silence and stared at her as if he couldn't believe his ears. Much to his horror, the girl's eyes welled with tears. But Sasuke would not be felled, his black brows snapped angrily together.

She had some nerve mentioning that name in his house, he silently grouched.

"It's Hyuuga to you," he scolded her. "And you will do no such thing, not if I have anything to do with it."

"Whooga," Uchito volunteered, spitting cake all over himself. "Whooga."

Sasuke was quick to wipe his mouth. "See your brother has got it right," he told her unashamedly smug; apparently impoliteness was something to be praised in children. "Now enough of this nonsense, you're giving me a headache."

Reika shook her head warily. "Uncle Neji knows how to cook and he would've brushed my hair for me."

His jaws clenched in annoyance. This blatant admiration for Neji that he felt coming from his daughter was absolutely unbecoming. He needed to have a serious talk with Tenten about having his kids hang around those pale eyed freaks.

"Eeka! Shhh!" Uchito urged, putting a tiny finger to his lips.

Brown eyes narrowed to slits as they fell on the baby. "Don't shush me!" she hissed. "Everything was fine until you came along and stole mommy and daddy from me!"

He blinked.

"Uncle Neji is the only person who still loves me," she sobbed, tears welled in her eyes and overflowed.

"This is new," Sasuke mused, frowning a little. "Where is all of this coming from?

"Admit it daddy," she cried. "You're not feeding me sweet treats because you can't cook. We could've easily gone to Ichiraku's. You're doing this to kill me off so Uchito will be your only child."

He shot her a look of brusque impatience. "Stop being dramatic. It's not making me like you very much right now."

"You don't like me at all," she shrieked. "It's because I won't possess your treasured Sharingan, isn't it?"

He goggled. How had she gone from critiquing his preparation of warm beverages to his parenting skills?

"That's why Uchito is favoured," she deduced. "I understand that he's little and mommy would have to spend more time with him but you—" she spat the pronoun like it was acid on her tongue. "—you pay more attention to him for another reason."

Sasuke wasn't sure how to respond to that so he kept quiet. Reika was probably more stoic than he had ever been as a child, so one could imagine how unsettled all of this was making him. This much emotion coming out of her was unusual. It took him back to a time when he tried to bake a cake for his dear wife and the gesture backfired on him—just as it had tonight.

The kid asked for hot chocolate and cake, he gave it to her and apparently he was a bad parent for doing so?

"Well I guess we can both agree on something," she suddenly declared. "I wish I was never born too!" she slammed down her mug and stormed upstairs to her room.

Sasuke and Uchito blinked in confusion.

There was no question about who had inherited the full blast of Tenten's fucking-crazy gene.

"You'll come back down these stairs if you know what's damn good for you, squirt," he warned, raising his voice only just slightly. "What has gotten into her?" he turned to his son, who merely shrugged his small shoulders in response.

Just as one door slammed shut another one creaked open and the hair on the nape of Sasuke's neck stood up.

His wife was back.

Just fucking perfect.

He swiftly and deftly cleaned up Uchito, set him on the floor and gave him instructions to go distract his mother while he cleared the table.

Tenten would have a fit if she found out what they had for dinner. Her kind of wrath he could handle with a little creativity, but he'd rather not have to deal with it in the wake of what transpired between him and his daughter.

It bothered him, pricked on his conscience.

"Aye aye daddy," Uchito playfully saluted his father and scampered towards the hall on his wobbly tiny legs. "Heyo mommy! El come back!" he piped on his way out.

Sasuke shook his head and chuckled. That damn boy could be awfully loud and chatty when he wanted to. And he probably would be exactly that for the rest of the night. He had a lot to tell Tenten once she got settled, of that Sasuke was certain.

"Is that mommy's best boy? Come give me a kiss!" Sasuke heard her exclaimed and then Uchito's giggles were filling the living room. "You've put on some weight," she noted aloud and Sasuke winced. "Where's daddy and that grumpy sister of yours?"

Uchito answered in his usual babble and Tenten seemed to have understood because she entered the kitchen shortly after the kid had finished ranting about his father and sister in his own little language.

"Is that so?" she asked the boy, nuzzling his nose with her own.

He nodded. "Daddy and Eeka," he jabbered on.

Tenten chortled. "And what about you? Did you cause any mischief too?"

His black eyes widened as if in appalled disbelief that his mother would question his innocence, "No mommy! Neher!"

"Never?" she arched a brow at him and his growing vocabulary. "Aren't you just the cutest?" Tenten gushed, showering his little round face with kisses.

Uchito did the same to her.

Sasuke scoffed.

She stopped greeting him like that since the kids came into the picture.

If only there was a return policy on children, he thought, shaking his head warily.

"Where's my princess?" she suddenly asked, looking around.

"In her broom," Uchito offered, grinning from ear to ear. Relief was etched all over his adorable features. No one was ever truly relaxed if Tenten wasn't home. "In her broom dying."

"In her room," Sasuke clarified then muttered beneath his breath, "—probably offering up the heads of her teddy bears as sacrifice to her cult."

"Crying?" Tenten enquired thickly, glaring at him. "Why is she crying?"

He fiddled nervously with his collars, "What makes you think she's crying?"

"Uchito just said—"

"—Uchito can barely string three words together to make a sentence," he argued, cutting in. "Don't be ridiculous Ten, Reika—"

"—nine!" the infant clapped, interrupting him.

He scowled, "Stop doing that."

His lips trembled at the sudden edge in Sasuke's voice and he buried his face in Tenten's neck. "Mommy, daddy hairy," Uchito sniffed a complaint.

"Did you hear that? He thinks you're scary." Tenten growled angrily. "Don't snap at him. What the fuck is your problem, Uchiha?"

"Every time I call you Ten, he screams nine," he explained in an exasperated tone.

She rolled her eyes at him. "Aww Chito, you're learning to count already?" the Kunoichi squeaked and proceeded to praised him in that annoying baby voice Sasuke hated so much. "Go get Reika, I brought back a souvenir from The Land of Rice for her to add to her collection."

Ever since Sasuke started doing it when Reika was six months old it became somewhat of a tradition to return with tokens from whichever village their missions took them.

"Give it to her in the morning. It's late," he said in an offhand manner and simply stood there looking expectantly at her, "Aren't you forgetting something?"

Like greeting him.

Tenten fixed him a razor sharp look, "I'm giving you the opportunity to go fetch Reika and make up with her before she comes downstairs," she told him warningly. "Because if I go upstairs and find my daughter crying you will be joining Itachi in the ground."

That jolted him, his eyes going huge as he stared at her, startled, and saw she looked to be serious.

He swallowed hard upon the realizing that while given the option he would rather face her than his daughter. Tenten could be shit scary but Reika's words had sent a stabbing little chill down Sasuke's back.

Had he really started to treat her differently since Uchito's birth? And did it have anything to do with the fact that he now had a child who would possess his bloodlimit? His eyes flashed angrily as he registered the astonishing level of his guilt but conceded that it hadn't been a conscious effort.

"Go daddy!" Uchito urged, pointing in the direction of the stairs. He must have sensed the intent in his mother's word and was panicking for Sasuke's safety. "Go et Eeka!"

Sasuke glowered and shifted his weight to one leg. He felt a little bitter about Tenten's neglect to utter a single word of greeting to him. "What makes you think I did something wrong?"

She steadied the baby on her hips and went to fill the kettle with water. "I know you Sasuke. Whatever happened is most likely your fault."

"Let me do that," he offered, dispensing the tea leaves she had retrieved into a mug and dispossessing her of Uchito. "She just got back, give her a break," he chided the fuming boy, set him aside and ushered Tenten around the table.

"Ew elfish daddy!" he stomped his feet in protest.

Sasuke bent to jab his forehead punishingly with his index finger then rose to his towering height, "You're the selfish one, now off you go," he shooed him.

"He is growing so fast," Tenten said, watching as Uchito stomped out of the room in a fit of rage, mumbling a myriad of what could only be baby curses. "I'm afraid one of these days I'll return from a long mission and not be able to recognized him."

"That won't happen," he told her, placing a steaming hot mug of green tea before her. "How was the mission?"

Tenten sighed heavily and leaned back in her chair. "Like any other mission," she said laconically, rolled her shoulders and took a sip of her tea. "I missed you."

He fixed himself a cold drink and sat next to her, "Is that so?" he snarled the words.

"Of course," she met onyx eyes which seemed to pin her to her seat as they surveyed her unwaveringly. "I can't go without my Sasuke-fix for too long. It makes me cranky."

He snorted, despite himself. "Sasuke-fix?"

"You know," she nudged him with her elbows and winked.

He felt himself flush, not simply because of her barely-censored remark but because he had lain awake every night since she left, missing the feel of her silky skin against his and at that small contact he felt a wild fire spread throughout his loins.

"No I don't know," he cleared his throat, trying to still his accelerating heartbeat.

She giggled. "Don't you long for a Tenten-fix too?"

He arched an amuse brow and smirked. "Give me one and maybe I'll be able to discern whether I needed it or not."

It was Tenten's time to go red.

A long-fingered hand came up to touch her hair gently, then the other hand seized her head and held it tilted up so that the light from the ceiling shone directly on to her face.

"What did I tell you about coming back to me all scratched up?" he asked accusingly. "And you've yet to greet me properly."

Before she realised his intention he bent and kissed her, his mouth cold from drink, just brushing her lips at first, then suddenly seeming to take fire.

The love and hunger that had nestled in his soul and made him a better man now reached out with clawed hand around is neck.

His kiss was suddenly hard and hot, wringing from her a faint, distressed sob. She could hear a drumming of pulses, but she could not be sure whether it was her own heart beating or his.

He lifted his head after what seemed an eternity.

Tenten touched her chest as she fought for breath, "Oh you definitely need it."

Just as he opened his mouth to speak, the sound of something tumbling down the stairs stopped him. Then Uchito's wails were echoing throughout the house.

"Oh my God," Tenten gasped in horror, getting to her feet. "Uchi—"

Sasuke was gone before she could finish saying his name. She scrambled after him and stumbled upon the sight of her baby sitting by the foot of the stairs with tears streaking down his face.

Her heart and stomach cramped painfully.

"Mommy!" he sobbed. "Eeka eave."

"Did your sister push you down the stairs?" Tenten demanded.

Uchito nodded then shook his head hastily at the murderous glint in his mother's eyes at his first answer. "No!"

"Did he hit anywhere?" she asked urgently.

Sasuke was already on his knees before him, checking that he hadn't broken any bones or hurt himself too badly. "He's fine, except for the nasty bruise on his forehead," he told her as he looked him over, sharingan activated.

She couldn't even breath a sigh of relief. Uchito was screaming at the top of his lungs. "Go et Eeka Daddy!" he shrieked. "Eeka eave."

Tenten's brows furrowed at the crumpled piece of paper he held in his small fist. "What's that?" she asked, bringing Sasuke's attention to it.

He gently pried Uchito's palm open and unfolded the paper. There was something scribbled on it in Reika's large and neat print.

 _Dear Mommy, thank you for everything. Take care of Uchito. Love, Reika._

"What is it?" Tenten asked, panic in her voice. "Are you sure he didn't hurt his wrist? Give him to me. Let me see."

"Tenten," he said grimly. "Go check on Reika."

"Why, what's wrong?" she looked up from where she had thrown herself down and was rocking Uchito in her arms, trying to comfort him.

"I think she might have ran away," he said slowly.

She rolled her eyes and laughed, "An Uchiha running away? Isn't that becoming some sort of cliche?"

"This is serious," he showed her the note.

She just stared at him open mouthed. Her brain formulated no thoughts other than to register that she was shocked. She closed her mouth, then looked blankly at her feet before glancing back up to catch the genuine worry in Sasuke's eyes.

Disbelief buckled through Tenten. "You can't be serious."

* * *

 **A/N: Yes. You read right. Its a SasuTen family fic. But this is only three chapters long :) It would've been posted to "A Sweet Addiction" as a one shot but 12k words for a one shot is kind of outrageous so I have split it up. Expect this to end quickly lol.**

 **There are like zero SasuTen family fics out there so I wanted to write one. Thanks for reading. Reviews are very much appreciated. Pretty please? ;) If you guys don't keep the flame alive, authors won't either.**

 **Credits to megamac1296 for helping me to piece over the cracks in the plot. Thank you for writing Clandestine. The epilogue really inspired this short story. And shout out to Sayori Hollywood for the encouragement. Of course I would love to thank every single SasuTen fan (and non-fan) who have come across my work and supported me. It means a lot. You guys are like family to me. You are the only ones who value this aspect of who I am. In real life no one really supports my passion for writing.**

 **Thank you :)**

 **I know what you are all thinking... "Uchito Uchiha? Seriously? What the fuck Princess Hyuuga?"**

 **Lol (*^﹏^*)**


	2. Irony Screams

" **The areas in which we felt most insecure, unsafe, unloved, uncomfortable, embarrassed, angry, and generally unresolved as a child are the areas that we will be most prone to self-deception as an adult."**

 **— Cortney S. Warren,**

The small knapsack she carried proved to be a hindrance as Reika dashed through the woods, leaping over thin winding creaks and slippery rocks.

It had been a few hours since she snuck through the gates of Konoha—without a destination in mind or any sense of direction. All she knew was that she'd rather be anywhere but the village.

The only thing her father cared about was the Sharingan and since she wouldn't wield it ultimately he didn't care about her. It was becoming more and more evident in the way he treated her brother as opposed to how he treated her.

Heck, even the _Uchi_ portion of his name indicated how treasured he was.

Uchito.

The true _Uchi_ ha.

She thought feverishly about it until her head spun and pounded with tension. Uchito was a very lovable character, even Reika had to admit, but his existence had stolen her tranquility and her security. It hadn't granted her any favours. All it had done was left her with a hideous sense of inadequacy and self-loathing and a temper as unreliable as an active volcano.

She dodged and zipped past rotting oak trees and under lowered and snapped branches. Everything blurred into dizzying blend of earthly colours. The earth was wet and moist beneath her sandals. There was no snow, but a fine layer of frost lay over the trees and the crunch of the concrete like soil was audible with each footstep.

She jumped into a muddy brook, swollen by the recent rains and soaked her clothes.

Her eyes swam in tears of frustration but she wiped at them and carried on.

"If I am to surpass daddy, I will have to find my own strength," she sniffed.

Her nose should've been pink by now from all the sneezing but with the temperature so low, it was as ashened as the rest of her.

"It would've been easier with the Sharingan," she grudgingly admitted and adjusted the straps of her bag.

She thought back to Tenten—the person she loved more than anything—and hoped she hadn't ruined her mother's opinion of her. It would crush her, because Tenten's love was the one thing Reika was certain of in life. The one thing that made her feel like a part of the family.

Uchito this, Uchito that.

That was all Sasuke was about.

Sharingan this, Sharingan that.

It made her question whether he truly saw value in her mother. She didn't possess the Sharingan or was from any notably skilled family. In fact, Reika was told that her mother only got a surname through marrying her dad. It struck her as odd that she would've been his first choice of a bride since all he cared about was having powerful Uchiha heirs.

She remembered hearing whispers on the playground about her father having been a traitor and that he only returned to Konoha and settled down so he could restore his clan—the clan that Uncle Itachi wiped out in a single night.

It was a messed up situation.

She wondered exactly how powerful the Uchihas had been if a mere teenage boy had made them nearly extinct. But, he was no ordinary boy, old man Kakashi had once told her. Just as she was no ordinary girl, he conceded, saying she was the Itachi of her generation.

Reika didn't know whether it had been a praise or an admonishment, she only knew that it couldn't have been any further from the truth.

Itachi had the Sharingan. She didn't, or rather, she wouldn't.

There was no ground for a comparison there.

Still, what bothered her the most was the thought that her daddy was using their mother to further his ambitions—to populate the clan?

It was the only explanation—the kid at the playground had told her—why someone of Uchiha Sasuke's calibre would've chosen her mother—a woman who should've remained a civilian rather than become a ninja, he derided—for his wife. He said her daddy was only interested in her mommy because she didn't possess a Kekkei Genkai or features distinguishable enough to completely cancel out or make the Uchiha gene recessive.

Reika supposed that statement answered her earlier question about Tenten's value to Sasuke.

And as she thought about her mother in comparison to the other Kunoichi, heaviness crushed her. While she never thought of Tenten as plain, under skilled or lacking in anyway, the truth was there.

Insistent and brutal.

It forced itself upon her.

Like blows to the head.

Reality slammed into her and hatred burned in her eyes for her father and the despicable manipulator that he was.

Her heart pounded and adrenaline surged in her body. Crackling through her like overloaded static.

There was a ball of pain in her chest, she acknowledged, and it grew larger with every step she took.

The once thick heavy undergrowth of the forest began to dissipate before a clearing. It laid ahead with almost perfect circular symmetry.

The notable absence of trees gave it the appearance of the point of impact of a bomb or even part of the footprint of a giant of almost unimaginable proportions. Like the ones from the tales her mother read to them.

Surrounding the clearing was an army of trees standing guard as if to protect the empty space from the rest of the advancing forest with their branches extending as if to ward off the curious trees who leaned back and forth to see what laid ahead of them with such subtlety they almost appeared to be standing still.

Reika was too wrapped up in her thoughts and the riot of emotions that assailed her and to hear the twig that snapped beneath a boot behind her.

If daddy didn't love mommy then there was no way he would love me either, she thought. Not when we look so much alike and especially not when I wouldn't have the Sharingan.

The only difference was that her mother would have use to Sasuke, after all someone has to bear him more children.

"But me—" she thought aloud, "—I would just be a burden."

She had considered speaking to Uncle Neji about it. He would've understood. He too was from a clan where children who didn't posses the family's bloodlimit weren't really considered as part of the family. But Uncle Neji did possess the Byakugan, she reminded herself, so he might not be able to relate. His issue was not a lack of the clan's Kekkei Genkai, rather its division into a Main and Branch family.

"Would daddy establish a main and branch family in our clan?" she wondered and was absolutely horrified that she would probably be the first branch member.

She imagined the clan's politics would become similar to that of the Hyuuga's but the principle of segregation would be different. More rigid.

Earlier when she arrived at the Hyuuga compound to speak with Uncle Neji, Reika was informed that he was away on a mission and was then told off by Hanabi for being out at night without an adult. Of course she knew Hanabi was merely panicking at the thought of having Sasuke discover his child on Hyuuga grounds.

There would forever remain an area of lifeless sticks of charcoal where canopies of green trees once resided in the Hyuuga Garden, as a reminder of the last time the head of the Uchiha household visited.

Reika had casted the region a pitying glance when she stopped by. The unfettered light illuminated the scorched ground and the smell of burning lingered still, despite the rain.

Daddy's fire ball jutsu is very impressive, she mused.

Pity, she had been counting on Neji being around so some light could be shed on the circumstances surrounding her parents' marriage before she left. She wanted to know that her mother would be in good hands even if those hands didn't love her.

She shook her head in tearful dismay and the tangled curls of her hair thrashed wildly on her shoulders.

Daddy never lets Uchito's hair go unbrushed for a single day, she acknowledged bitterly. But it all made sense now.

Only prized Uchihas were _polished_.

OoOoOoOo

Silence thundered.

The laughter evaporated from Tenten's eyes. Her customary warmth gone faster than summer rain on the tarmac.

Her brown eyes.

There was an emptiness in them but not in any vulnerable sense. Uncomfortable with the void, she had filled it with an emotion that was more suited for the situation—raw anger. The unmoving gaze was accompanied by deliberate slow breathing, like she was fighting something back and loosing.

Then she gruffly brushed aside her bangs and pinned Sasuke with a stare that could have frozen the entire Fire Country.

She snarled more than spoke. "What the fuck did you do this time?"

His dropped his gaze to the floor and hooked his thumbs into his trousers. The strangest little pang of guilt nudged at his conscience and provoked a deep flush on his troubled face. "I didn't do anything."

"Don't give me that," she growled, coming to her feet. "I heard the door to her bedroom slam before I even entered the house."

Uchito's sobbing quieted down and he stuffed his fingers in his mouth, watching the exchange between his parents from where Tenten had sat him down.

"If your ears are so sharp I imagined you heard how rudely she spoke to me as well?" It was more of a sarcastic remark rather than an account or enquiry.

Her mouth twisted with flagrant distaste. "This is not the time to be smart," Tenten took a step towards him, a vein almost popping in her temple and her fists tightly clenched.

Sasuke stayed right where he was. Well over six feet in height, he had shoulders like axe handles and a massive chest, but years of service to Anbu had taxed even his impressive resources.

"What happened?" she demanded sharply, her delicately cut profile set in lines of derision.

The question ripped into his heart more surely than if she'd burst into tears. The distraught expression on her face made it feel as if there were a blade twisting in his guts.

"That's what I'd like to know," he frowned, treating her to a look of pained male incomprehension.

"Enough with the half-assed responses, Uchiha—" she took another step forward, in turn treating him to a chilling look of cold menace. If they were similar in height then they would've been almost nose to nose. "—I will fucking cut you."

"Mommy! Beehive!" Uchito gasped, as if he thought she would start packing punches at his father any minute now.

"Yes. Behave," Sasuke agreed, leaning forward to briefly—spitefully—cover her lips with his.

He giggled and threw his little palms over his eyes, grimacing. "Yuck, daddy!"

When Sasuke pulled back Tenten's hands were flexing furiously at her side as if to reach up and slap him. A fierce flush lit her cheeks. "This is not the time to be fucking around," she mumbled.

He turned to Uchito and elevated a brow. "So it's okay for you to do it and not me?"

The brat had the audacity to nod. "My mommy!" was all he said in his defense.

"My wife," Sasuke countered indulgently, returning his attention to Tenten. He found himself being regarded much as he himself might have regarded a cockroach. A lump ballooned in his tight throat. "Stay with him, I'll go find her. She couldn't have gone very far," he said and swallowed hard.

As he was about to take off a hand whipped out and closed round his forearm to stay him.

"You stay with Uchito, I'll go look for her," she told him in a tone that would've meant she got the final say had Sasuke been a lesser man.

He shrugged her off gently. "You just came back. Rest," he said softly but Tenten's face remained hard.

"Rest?" her voice was a sick thread of sound. "How can I rest at a time like this?"

Panic was clawing at her. It started out as thin cellophane, something fingers might be able to pierce breathing holes in. Then it became a deluge of ice water surrounding every limb, creeping higher until it passed her mouth and nose.

"I'll find her," he grasped her hand and gave it an assuring squeeze. "It's cold out, stay home."

"Why don't you stay with Uchito? Reika ran away because of you. She might just kill herself if you're the one to find her," a bitter little laugh was dredged from her tight throat until her strained voice shook and she compressed her lips to silence herself.

For a split second, Sasuke stared at her, inky black lashes low on his stabbing gaze. Then a flicker of something she couldn't distinguish softened the hard line of his mouth for a moment, and Tenten gave him a suspicious glare.

"Did you scold her for talking about being in love with Neji again?"

As if it was the worst possible conclusion to have ever been drawn, a frown marred the smooth perfection of his forehead.

"Don't remind me of that or I might just forget that this is my fault and ground her for the rest of her life." he said rawly, slashing an overpoweringly arrogant hand through the air in emphatic command.

"Then what is it?" Tenten pressed.

A change came over him as he gave an account of the incident.

She lifted her hand to her head, suddenly feeling dizzy from lack of sleep, stress and disbelief. "My poor baby. Why would she think we loved Uchito more?"

"It's because he will possess the Sharingan," he explained, a muscle started throbbing in his jaw. He shook his head slightly, and even shrank back a little, as if he was unsettled by the accusation for good reason.

"I don't love any one more than the other," Tenten said, sounding utterly dejected. "I know what it's like to grow up without the privilege of a Kekkei Genkai. It would be hypocritical of me to chastise my child for something beyond both our control."

"Reika never said you did," he explained. "She said I did."

"Well do you?" she demanded, but the expression of guilt she saw in his face cut her to the quick.

"Was that why you were so insistent on having another child? Because Reika wouldn't have the Sharingan?" Tenten asked, suddenly sounding angrier than Sasuke had ever heard her. "Usually you two iron out your difference right away, but this time you couldn't reassure her—" she summarized.

"The Sharingan is what makes us Uchihas," he stated simply.

"—you couldn't because she wasn't wrong was she?" she shuddered in disgust and then registered in horror what he said. "So I guess by definition she isn't an Uchiha. I can't believe you'd say that."

He stared down at her in shock at such an assumption. But her impassioned outburst had struck a chord deep inside him. Another rush of emotion stormed up through him, overwhelming him once again. He cleared his throat gruffly, and turned away.

"Don't you dare turn your back on me," Tenten said, pulling him back towards her. "It's no wonder she ran away, I feel like doing the same damn thing after hearing what you just said."

Sasuke felt himself smiling.

Like mother like daughter.

Both irrational and crazy.

A bubble of laughter burst out of him. "The mere fact that she has ran away is proof enough of her Uchiha lineage."

"Do you think this is fucking funny?" she asked, thumping hard on the chest. "I know what it's like to walk in her shoes."

Colour came and went in her face, tears of rage spiking her lashes, trembling there before falling, streaking her cheeks and dripping off the end of her elegant nose. She didn't care. It was a terrible thing for their daughter to feel so unloved and unwanted that she'd run away.

Sasuke caught her hands in his, and gathered them up to him, looking seriously into her eyes once more. "So do I," he said, with heart-wrenching honesty.

Tenten licked her dry lips and waited, fingers rolled into feverish fists because she was so desperate to acquaint it with his arrogant cheekbones.

"Are you forgetting that I had a sibling?"

"Let's not make this about you," she snapped.

Sasuke breathed in slowly like a non-swimmer about to plunge into a deep pool without a lifebelt. "I know what it's like to grow up in someone's shadow." Tenten felt a tremble pass through him, and she looked up to see the shimmer of moisture in his eyes. "My father constantly made it seem as if Itachi should've been the first and last child he had. I don't want for Uchito to ever feel that way."

"So this isn't about the Sharingan?" she concluded.

Dark eyes glittered over her as he confided that, "It isn't, not from my end. With or without the Sharingan, Reika will do great things. Uchito will have to live up to expectations formed based off her performance. I don't want him thinking he has to impress anyone—especially not me."

Her smile was sheer, infuriating irony. "By trying to prevent a repeat of your relationship with your father from happening with Uchito you end up forging the same madness between yourself and Reika." He shuddered as she said, his eyes turning momentarily bleak. "Don't you find that ironic? He isn't even three feet tall yet and she is already living in his shadow."

He was searching her face, his expression earnest as he affirmed, "I might not be able to relate well with her but that was never my intention."

"I also find it ironic that you don't relate well to the child who is most like you." A smile broke out over Tenten's face and she felt her heart swell to bursting with understanding and compassion. "Go get our baby."

OoOoOoOo

"Uchiha Reika," a voice slithered through the thick veils of trees she left behind and the mentioned girl's entire body turned cold and damp with instinctive fear. "Don't you know your daddy is out looking for you?"

Her heart lurched sickly against her breastbone, the oxygen locking at the foot of her convulsed throat.

She jerked round in horror.

Involuntarily, she glanced up and froze.

Her beautiful face stiffened like pale, tear-streaked marble into stricken stillness. Sheer shock slowed her heartbeat to a numbing thud that echoed sickly in her eardrums.

"I never thought I'd find you luring in a place like this," her companion croaked, staring down at her, apparently entrapped by the same immobility that paralyzed her. "You are really your father's child."

A wave of dizziness engulfed her as she collided with deep-set eyes—golden eyes.

"Sasuke was always more trouble than he was worth," he murmured thickly, one fluid movement brought him to tower before her. "I was hoping that for your sake you wouldn't turn out the same."

Her bemused gaze locked with compulsive intensity to his and she noted the odd slits in his pupils and the strange colouring around his eyes.

Recognition dawned on her and it was as terrifying as walking off a cliff edge and falling—and falling—and falling. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't speak. It frightened her.

Reika didn't know whether she should curse her rotten luck or count her blessings that she had stumbled upon him. He would have all the answers to all her question—and a possible solutions to her problems. After all, he couldn't be considered legendary for nothing.

Still, she knew it all would come at a price she wouldn't be willing to pay.

Then again, she heard how her daddy had pulled one over him, many times at that and couldn't help but question his alleged wisdom. Did he hold any grudges, she wondered.

Who wouldn't?

She turned white as death and backed away on legs that were ready to buckle. A cold spasm of fear impelled her at the realization that a cost would be incurred no matter whether or not she asked anything of him.

That was the reality that scared her.

* * *

 **A/N: Do you see the significance of naming the child** **Uchi** **to? I know at least one person must have wondered, what the fuck kind of name is that lol. I promise you its real! I found it on Google lol.**

 **So, I have a proposition, if anyone can tell me what they noticed about the kids' names in relation to Sasuke's and Tenten's names then…I will write you a SasuTen one-shot with a plot of your choice.**

 **Thanks for reading. Reviews are always appreciated :) I hope you guys are enjoying this or I'd actually feel stupid for troubling myself with writing this. I was under the impression that the fandom need sasuten family fics. My own thirst for it, I suppose?**


	3. Doubt Whispers

" **The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place."**

— **George Bernard Shaw**

The moon shone intimidatingly on the land beneath it—like that of the eye of the devil straight into the soul of the damned. The soul of Uchiha Reika.

The black before them had a velvet quality, like the air had been thickened somehow. Without an upwards glance she knew the sky was star speckled and cloudless. There was absolute stillness. Even her breath seemed to die as soon as it left her mouth under the uncomfortably intense scrutiny she was being subjected to.

"I was made aware the moment you left the village," his voice sounded as if it had been filtered through ice.

She swallowed.

"And just as someone who cared about your father had tried to stop him from leaving, the same thing happened to you, tonight." He released a bleak laugh that was like a cold hand trailing down her spine.

Uchito, she flushed guiltily.

He settled his peculiar eyes on her, "—except Sasuke hadn't been quite as dramatic. You could've broken your brother's neck."

Aware of the undertones of tension pulling at her, Reika shifted uneasily. A tiny shudder of agonizing emotional pain arrowed through her little heart. She hadn't meant to hurt the baby.

Uchito had been pulling on the ends of her shirt and screaming unintelligibly at her—no doubt pleading with her not to go—when she gruffly shrugged him off. He took a tumble down the stairs and in complete panic she fled.

Her wide eyes prickled with a sudden hot rush of spontaneous tears. "Is he alright?"

"Guilt? From an Uchiha? It turns out you have a little of your mother in that black soul of yours," he bit out an unamused laugh before responding. "The fact that Sasuke is out with blood in eyes looking for you could only mean that your brother isn't."

She was frozen, the animated colour in her face fading fast to leave her whiter than milk.

Uchito was hurt and it was all her fault.

Her heart sank to the soles of her feet and she almost tottered back on legs that felt too woolly to keep her standing upright.

Telling herself not to be fainthearted, Reika launched in. "If you came here to guilt me into going back to the village I'm afraid you're wasting your time, dobe." In a pause for breath she heard him chuckle again. "I'm not going anywhere," she declared.

He stared back at her with brooding eyes, revealing neither satisfaction nor surprise at her insolence and obvious refusal to acknowledge him for who he was.

The Seventh Hokage.

Ever since she was able to speak, Reika had been addressing Naruto as the various belittling names that Sasuke himself had once used and perhaps still used to refer to him.

The funny thing was that she had the utmost respect for Team Gai. According to her she didn't see any point in worshipping a bunch of people, who, her father spoke anything **but** highly of. He—Naruto—was a ramen-obsessed, gender-confused _(sexy jutsu come to mind?)_ moron _;_ Sakura was a deranged fangirl whose goal in life was to jump her daddy's bones and Kakashi was tardy pervert with stolen abilities.

He doubted she even understood the meaning of the term _'to jump one's bones'_ but he was certain those had been Sasuke's words and not hers.

Oddly enough Reika got along well with Rock Lee despite her lack of appreciation for bubbly characters. She saw him as someone to emulate—a shinobi, who, regardless of not having chakra was able to accomplish what others with chakra hadn't—couldn't. His stamina and speed were stuff of legend. Then there was always the added bonus of the fact that he spoiled her rotten and was always willing to entertain her on Team Gai's training grounds.

As outrageous as Gai-sensei was she said he would've made a cooler sixth Hokage than that Icha-Icha loving, old fart—ie. Kakashi. And of course there was Neji; Tenten must've made him out to be some sort of God because Reika completely idolized him.

Clearly the child's impression of her parents' former team members had been formed through the stories she was told about them. But obviously, ensuring that those impressions were good ones hadn't been a priority for Sasuke.

"Is that the Sage Mode?" Reika asked, dealing Naruto's yellow, toad-like irides a surveying appraisal. She had heard wondrous tales of the power he wielded whilst in that state. "First daddy, Itachi, Obito, Madara and now me, don't you get tired of chasing our kind around?"

He scratched the back of his head and grinned. This girl was too much like her father for her own damn good, he thought to himself. "I don't know about the others but as your God father my job is never done," he offered lamely.

She arched a brow and pinned him with a skeptic look. "I'm pretty sure it's a mother's job that's never done," she corrected tersely and her chin came up at a truculent angle. "And what was the need to go into Sage Mode? Is fighting defenseless children a part of your job description?" she snickered derisively.

"It made it easier to find you," Naruto confessed in a not quite steady rush.

For a split second that look on his face softened something inside her but she fought it. "Who said I wanted to be found?" she folded her arms, dark eyes brandishing a fierce challenge. "Daddy doesn't love me anymore, so why stick around?"

That comment hit him like a bucket of icy water, shocking him and filling him with confusion.

"What are you talking about?" He made to close the distance between them but Reika shook her head furiously and backed away.

"The other kids said my mother was a convenient womb and that I would be resented for not having the Sharingan," she breathed unevenly, tears rolling down her cheeks unchecked until she dashed a hand across her face in an embarrassed gesture and sniffed furiously. "They said—they said—" she choked and swallowed as if to keep a particularly unpleasant thought down. "How can he value the people who love him the most so little?"

"Reika," he said her name bleakly.

"All he cares about is Uchito," she told him awkwardly, her voice hoarse as she dabbed at her damp cheeks. This was partly the reason she found Naruto so irritating, without even asking a single question he could always get her to open up. "He doesn't even play with me anymore."

Naruto sighed as the colour around his eyes receded—as if it seeped back into the pores of his skin—and the blue in his eyes returned with deep reflective emotion. He heard Reika's loud intake of breath—almost as gasp—as she watched him come out of the Sage Mode.

"Sasuke plays?" he questioned with a bemused frown.

Yes, he was aware that the Uchiha could be tender when he wanted to, but it wasn't a notion that took him very often, Naruto conceded painfully. He had seen the way he looked at Tenten the day when they learned that she had conceived. Sasuke's own initial unconcealed pleasure in the discovery that she was pregnant had made Tenten swallow back and conceal her own very different feelings on the same score. Naruto knew she had qualms about becoming a parent, especially as a Kunoichi.

Yet he knew that given the chance, Tenten would never turn the clock back. She probably wouldn't even be able to recall those confusing reactions when Uchito and Reika had since become the very centre of her world—and Sasuke's. So, Naruto really couldn't understand what was going on.

Just the other day Sasuke was shoving his genius daughter in their faces; using the fact that he had children to question Naruto's masculinity—because the fox had yet to produce an heir—and in the case of Sakura, he was just doing it for the sake of being an asshole. She never did get over the fact that he married Tenten.

"Is all this reason enough to run away?" he gave Reika a cynical stare.

Temper ripped through her tiny frame like a storm warning. After all, he wouldn't understand. He didn't have children and he hadn't grown up with siblings. He never knew the love of a parent or having to share that love.

"I know what you're thinking," he told her softly, his voice gentled.

Her mind whirled uncomprehendingly and she drew back, her eyes narrowed. "What?"

"That I wouldn't understand," he came to kneel before her, resting a hand atop her head. "But I do understand. Iruka-sensei was like a father to me and I had to share him with all the other kids at the academy." Briefly he let a faint smile lift his sad mouth. "Even you have to admit that's far worse than having to share Sasuke with your brother?"

A searing pain ripped through her and she hastily lowered her head, unable to bear the compassion which further lit his eyes and turned them into brilliant lapis lazuli.

Stupid Naruto.

Why did he always have to find something from his own experience to counter her complaints?

But try as he might to be an example to her, all Reika saw was the goofy, little dweeb her father made him out to be. Still, behind those eyes was the kind of wisdom that only those who had gone through hell and back would ever behold.

"Then during my Genin days, I had to compete not only with your father for Sakura-chan's attention but also for Kaka—"

"My father never competed for her attention," Reika pointed out flatly then contradicted with all the quiet, unhesitating assurance a five year old could muster. "He never even wanted it."

"Of course not, he was only ever interested in your mother," Naruto agreed warmly, scooping her up into his arms. "In fact he pimped his entire team out just to get to her."

To her fury, her eyes filled with tears and she wrapped her arms around his neck with an easy kind of affection that was only reserved for her daddy. Affection that was rarely exercised because the opportunity hardly presented itself. At least, for her.

"Don't lie to me, Naruto. His only interest in mommy was to produce heirs."

He goggled. It was the first he had ever heard her address him by his given name. "Where did you get that idea?" he asked, remorse tearing at his insides.

There could be some truth in her assumption, he conceded. However, Reika and Uchito were more as a result of Sasuke not being able to keep his hands to himself rather than a need to procreate. And Naruto couldn't exactly say that the Uchiha's only interest in the Tenten was _**that**_ either. In his wife, Sasuke had found a companion—a confidant—family—a friend.

If his love for anyone amounted to even a fraction of what it was for Tenten, then that person could consider themselves thoroughly love. Sasuke's fondness bordered on being an obsession. Naruto remembered having to offer Tenten refuge at his home during her pregnancy when Sasuke's over-protectiveness had simply gotten out of control.

"Why else would he marry her?" Reika sobbed into his shirt. "The other kids said—they—" she choked. "We were all talking about our parents and they started bashing mommy and speaking ill of daddy."

Naruto smoothed her hair and felt his heart grow heavily with despair. He remembered the whispers that filled the playground anytime he had set foot on it as a child. But he never imagined that Reika would've gotten so torn up over a couple snide remarks that were obviously malicious in their intent. She knew the truth after all, didn't she?

He on the other hand hadn't.

Yet, at the end of the day Reika was just a kid. And perhaps he too, like Sasuke, was guilty of forgetting that because of how maturely they were accustomed to seeing her present herself.

"They said she conspired with a traitor—a traitor who used her to further his selfish goals." Her shoulders shook on each word. "I don't care about what he did in the past; I just want him to love my mother. She deserves that at least," she cried indignantly, clutching onto Naruto.

"What makes you think that he doesn't?"

She offered no response, merely continued to cry.

He wondered if he had further upset her by asking but dispelled the notion because it had in fact been a fair question. She lived long enough with her parents—and was perceptive enough—to be able to discern whether what they had going on between them was genuine or a facade.

Silently, grimly even, he rubbed her back, his eyes wide open and staring at nothing in particular. Then he spoke, his voice charged with mirth. "Like I said, your father pimped out our entire team just to get close to your mother. The fact that he actually made an effort with her speaks volumes."

"Pimped?" she sniffed.

"Yes, he did." Laughing, he removed bits of dried leaves from her curly mass of hair. "One day he surprised us by suggesting we trained with Team Gai since they were the fastest team and we needed to work on our speed," he sighed at the memory. "Even Kakashi-sensei had been sold on the idea."

He then went on to explain that this all happened during their Genin days and that Sasuke had been so discrete, no one picked up on what was really going on.

"I agreed because I had a beef to pick with Neji," he told her in a rather animated kind of tone. "And Sakura thought that Sasuke was making an attempt to include her—or rather, invite her into his life—by offering to have her tag along. So naturally she agreed as well."

Reika's sobs quieted down.

"Little did we know that he had brought her along as a distraction for Brushy Brow," he flung his head back and laughed at the irony. "See, Sasuke knew Lee was infatuated with Sakura and that by having her tag along Lee would spend more time ogling her and less time being the thorn that protected their team's _youthful flower_."

"Youthful flower?" she almost giggled. That just about summed up her mother, as corny as the name was. "What about Uncle Neji, who distracted him?"

"That was where I came in," he told her. "Teme knew how I felt about the thrashing Neji gave Hinata during the Chunin exams so he used it to his advantage and like a fool I felt for it."

"Sounds like daddy alright," her voice was muffled against his shirt, her breath warm on his neck.

"Neji kept winning our sparring battles and I kept on challenging him to rematches, which was essentially what Sasuke wanted—all her teammates out of the way." Naruto was quick to argue however, that Neji only kept on being victorious because he had a home soil advantage. "Eventually he got frustrated with having to fight the same opponent every session and I suspect he had grown suspicious but by then Sasuke had already wormed his way inside Tenten's head."

"So the old man was a distraction for Gai-sensei by default?" she rose her head from his chest and stared into his face.

He cracked a smile. "Yes."

Her lip curled into a sardonic grimace, "That doesn't prove anything, Hokage," she mocked with all the warmth of an ice-burg. "He could've easily handpicked her at an early age. Daddy likes to plan ahead."

Naruto laughed. "Are you five or fifty?"

Reika playfully jabbed his chest with her thumb.

"It still baffles me that Tenten fell for your father's cheap tricks," he frowned. "Teme had no game at all."

"Your wife was the head of daddy's fan club and he didn't even have to try to impress her," she reminded him bluntly. "So you shouldn't talk."

His deep laughter rumbled in his chest. Then it was replaced with a tangible tension.

Reika swallowed, wondering if she had offended him.

"The morning before he left the village, just before the crack of dawn—" he murmured gravely, closing his eyes briefly and drew a ragged breath. "—I caught him sleeping on a tree branch outside your mother's bedroom window. She had been stricken with the flu for weeks. Thinking about it now, Sasuke might've purposely held off going to Orochimaru sooner because he wanted to make certain she recovered fully."

"Daddy did that?" she asked in a strained tone. With all her arrogance stripping away, she looked achingly vulnerable—looked like the child that she was. "He stayed back for mommy?"

Naruto nodded. "Sasuke is a very complex person. He's also very private. I didn't come to learn that he knew Tenten before the academy until recently."

"He did?"

"Apparently she used to peep through the bushes while he trained with your uncle as a child."

"Itachi?"

"Yes. That was how she came to learn the Kunai Dance technique—" he chuckled. "—a technique Sasuke has yet to master. She used to watch Itachi try to teach it to him and eventually mastered it on her own."

Reika fell silent, seemingly lost in her thoughts.

"Your parent's relationship had always been more that what meets the eyes," he slid his hand beneath her chin and tilted her face. "Don't let the negative things people say about it affect how you feel about your dad. Sasuke would never have committed himself to your mother hadn't he harboured some semblance of feelings for her."

Tears scalded her throat, but she forced herself to swallow them. This was breaking her heart, in all the right places. "Daddy loved mommy since they were my age?"

"Who do you think gave her the first kunai set she owned?" he winked. A faint breeze was in the air, it ruffled his golden locks and his sudden grin made her own face break out into a smile. "You know—the ones she has on display in that glass shelf by the hall?" he asked, making certain there was absolutely no mistaking the set he was talking about.

She blinked, not seeing the connection. "Mommy said they were a gift from some random donator at the orphanage she grew up in."

Naruto shook his head on the contrary, "Itachi and Sasuke had secretly gotten her those. They figured she could use her own set rather than having to try and attempt the technique using imaginary blades."

She giggled. "You mean they used to spy on mommy too?"

"Sasuke more so than Itachi," he shifted her in his arms. "Shall we go?"

"None of my issues have been resolved," she said brokenly, tears slipping down her cheeks. "I don't want to go back home. I can't face mommy after what I did and it will only give daddy another reason to hate me."

"Have you taken a good look at yourself?" he asked urgently. Sharp knives were ripping his insides to shreds, and he reached his thumb across her cheeks to wipe away the moisture. "You are the splitting image of your mother, which is enough reason for Sasuke to love you—with or without the Sharingan."

In the silence that trembled between them, a voice echoed inside Reika head and she shook it as if to fend it off. "That's not true. Whether I look like mommy or not, without the clan's Kekkei Genkai I'll never be accepted."

"So what do you plan to do?" he demanded coolly. "Become a missing-nin at age five and damn Uchito to a life of hunting you down for the kill?"

She closed her eyes briefly as pain tore through her. Again and again.

"—because that would just be your uncle's and father's story all over again."

Dull colour scorched her cheekbones. "If it comes to that then so shall it be. I am after all the Itachi of my generation," she drawled bitterly.

"Do you really want to leave your mother behind?" Naruto asked gently. "You're so concerned about Sasuke hurting her, yet here you are about to do the same thing."

It felt as though she had received a hammer-blow to her heart. The last person she would ever want to hurt was her dear mother.

A tense silence quivered between them before Naruto finally spoke again. "That's very hypothetical of you."

"Hypocritical," she corrected roughly.

"I've entertained your smart ass for far too long," he said harshly. "You're being a brat with no real reasons for wanting to run away besides being selfish."

Reika's jaws dropped. "What?"

But he was deadly serious, she realized as she stared at his taut face, his skin stretched tightly over his cheekbones. "You're so much like Sasuke it's scary. Except when he ran away Sasuke hadn't a family he was leaving behind. They were all dead."

"What about Team Seven?" she countered dryly. "Weren't you guys supposed to be like family?"

"We were, but your dad didn't see it that way but that is besides the point," he gathered her more securely in his arms and set off amongst the tree. Beyond them nothing was visible but forest. "Don't change the subject. It's not Sasuke who doesn't value your mother Reika, it's you."

"Put me down you moron!" she shrieked, fidgeting wildly. "How can you even say something like that?"

The bleakness in his eyes tore at her. "You seem to be of the notion that you are without worth because you don't possess a bloodlimit. But you keep forgetting that like you, neither does Tenten. Without even realizing it you're questioning your own mother's worth. Do you resent her Reika—for not being born into a clan? Does it make you insecure?"

Her pride suddenly seemed unimportant—especially when he was spurting such absurd accusations. "I love my mother more than anything else in the world," she assured him quietly.

"Action speaks louder than words," he supplied laconically, stopping to pin her underneath his arm so she couldn't hinder his movements too much.

For a while she did not reply. Guilt, remorse, and a whole host of other emotions her young mind could not define filled her. Then she spoke, her voice shaking with emotion. "This isn't even about her."

His throat felt as though he had swallowed glass as he rasped, "Then what is all this about?"

"Me."

The deep, velvet soft voice of her father tethered out into the silence and panic churned in the pit of her stomach. A wave of intense dread surged up inside her and even though he hadn't stepped out of the shadows Reika could feel his eyes on her—angry, red and spinning. If how specked her skin was with goose bumps was any indication, he was staring at her with his Mangekyo activated.

"Teme?" Naruto called, blindly looking around.

"Put her down dobe," Sasuke told him steadily.

He pouted childishly, "Aw come on, I was just about to lecture her."

"If you want someone to lecture, go make your own damn kid," he emerged, seemingly out of thin air. His eyes were so hard and cold as they looked at her that Reika whimpered. "This one is mine. Too much mine," he declared.

* * *

 **A/N: So this ended up having four parts. This chapter fucking shitted on my muse and so I have decided to split it in two until I am in the mood to go through the second of half it.**

 **I hate when I start out liking a fic and then end up regretting having posted it because of trolls. It baffles me that someone would click on stories featuring a pairing that they don't even like and then complain and bash the couple in their review. Let's get something straight I love SasuTen and really don't give much of a fuck who doesn't. If you want something else, write your own damn story. Kindly leave me the fuck out of your pathetic shipping wars. Grow up. Plus, hating on my pairings only makes me love them more. Sooo... it's actually counterproductive on your end to waste your time bitching at me. I will NEVER stop liking what I like.**

 **Sorry for the rant, anyways, thanks for reading :) Reviews are always accepted but if you're planning to leave a flame, save it for a day when they power's out and you're going to need it to light a candle.**


	4. Love Listens

" **...love is not determined by the one being loved but rather by the one choosing to love."**

— **Stephen Kendrick**

Even in the safety of the shadows, Reika knew Sasuke's expression hardened when Naruto left him alone with her. "Your mother is back, I suggest you get your act together." His voice was savage, pulsating with a fury that sent a frisson of unease through her body. "Let's go."

No non-sense and curt as always.

Her father wasn't a smooth talker. Except maybe when threatened with the prospect of having to sleep on the couch. And even then he didn't do much of a good job convincing her mother to let him back into the room. He was a failure at words.

She frowned and shook her head slowly—her back turned to him. "I'm not going anywhere with you."

Silence descended behind her, a thick anticipatory silence that throbbed like a silent heartbeat. It could be felt, but it couldn't be heard with anything more than the internal senses.

"It isn't up for a discussion," Sasuke raked his fingers through his hair, his voice was quiet and careful but rough with fury. "I don't like repeating myself."

That must've angered her because she slowly turned around—until she was blindly facing him. He saw hard purpose on her face. "Well neither do I," Reika snarled.

Bitterness filled him with a wave of pain so intense, he nearly drowned beneath it. The brat was furious, and she had no right to be. She could've broken her brother's neck and Tenten was home with her heart pounding against her chest. Sasuke himself felt trepidation rising inside him.

He'd already begun to suspect the truth—that her antics had more to do with him than herself—and the certainty of it now filled him with dread. With a resolute sigh he stepped from the shadows and watched her brown eyes widen, saw her blink, as though trying to make him disappear.

"Go away daddy," her voice sizzled.

He faced his daughter—the mirror of his past—now as he never had before. Nightmares, remorse and broken trust fragmented around him, drawing his soul into a bleak, dark void he had once feared that he could never escape.

"Reika," he said her name with an edge of pain and exasperation. "What is this about?"

Her expression went slack with shock, her eyes gleaming beneath the moonlight with at first something resembling hope then with fury. She stood there before him, shrouded in darkness, her eyes glittering with hatred.

Hatred.

He swallowed past the emotion clogging his throat, the regret lancing his chest and the disbelief he couldn't seem to shake. As though the world had shifted on its axis, pitching him into a world that was as different as it was the same the day before.

"What's wrong? Tell me so I can fix it," he could barely force the words past his lips. He wasn't used to being reduced to this—to groveling at anyone's feet, especially not a child. Only Tenten had the luxury of that.

"Fix it?" she sneered. A cold curve to her lips that twisted in his soul as he watched her.

Tiny fingers, as slender and graceful as life itself, reached beside her to pluck a rose from the thick bush at her side. She tore at the petals, ripping them casually from their delicate mooring—one by one—leaving them to drift in wounded splendor to the ground.

Staring at her was tearing his soul to pieces. Realizing that his child ran away because of the same thing he had always resented his own father for, was destroying the last thread of sanity Sasuke thought he had held onto all these years.

His past.

He didn't wish to be reminded of any element of it—good or bad, beautiful or ugly. He had locked any recollection—prior to his marriage—away in the furthest recesses of his mind and mentally smelted the keys.

That was baggage he could do without. He was a product of his past yes, but he refused to be a prisoner to it. It was partly why he couldn't return Sakura's affection—why he still resented it—it was a representation of love for something he hated. His former self. He didn't appreciate it. It was a constant reminder of the past.

One he wanted to bury.

And yet it beats inside him like a second heart.

The past beats in the image of his daughter.

He saw it in the dismissive way she treated Uchito and in the way she threw tantrums when he tried to teach her something and she couldn't get it right. Reika may not have a family in mind to avenge but there was a need welling inside her—a need for power—like a dark, hungry cloud.

It frightened him.

It was probably the most formidable opponent he had ever come across in all his life as a leaf shinobi, a missing-nin and now Anbu Captain.

"This little stunt of yours isn't cute anymore," he snarled, fury surging inside him, so hot, so deep it blistered the open wounds he had thought to be closed. "Tenten is worried sick out of her mind."

He had to clench his fingers into fists to keep from dragging her back to the village. The haze at the edge of his vision rippled and burned, turning the soft fall of the moonlights into a bloody aura.

Her gaze flickered over him, cold, unemotional, filled with victorious triumph at his disquiet.

"You say that like you actually care about her," she bared her teeth, her hatred crisp, clear, lining the beauty of her expression with remorseless hatred. "Let me worry about my mother. At least when I do it, it's genuine."

He fell back a step, feeling the blow to the pit of his soul. Tenten was the reason he had even fought in that damn war. The reason he had wanted peace. He had bled for her. Had nearly died for her. For this. Hatred from the product of his love for one woman.

"Don't meddle in things that you don't understand." His voice was hoarse, and he disliked her for that—abhorred the emotion tearing his heart to pieces as she watched him with the glimmer of amusement in her eyes.

"I understand perfectly daddy."

"Understand what?" he hissed.

Reika grunted, the sound filled with irony. "That you had no real interest in mommy other than to domesticate her for the production of heirs."

The words slammed into his chest. Sasuke's eyes narrowed to pinpoints of red anger. "What?"

She shrugged carelessly, "I also understand that the moment you came to learn that I wouldn't possess the Sharingan, my worth to you significantly fell."

Emotion filled her voice, but there were no tears, only stoicism and a sense of—reluctant resignation? So there was hope of convincing her otherwise, after all?

"Nothing you become will disappoint me," Sasuke said thoughtfully.

Glacial—Reika thought—his voice went with the cold look in his eyes and the straight line that his mouth was compressed into. It did nothing to cool or reassure her.

"I have no preconception that I'd like to see you be or do," he continued, a touch too desperately for his own liking, but it needed to be said. "I have no desire to foresee you, only to discover you, Reika. You can't disappoint me."

Those words.

He saw her wrestle with them.

It was the most profound thing she had ever heard left her father's mouth. He must've heard it somewhere before, Reika thought dryly. Still—those words—they felt like having a knife being plunged into her heart, each as painful as that first wound inflicted when those kids wrecked the illusion she had of her father.

She gave him a long, hard look.

"Tell me what your problem is—" he was frowning now. Irritation thickened his voice as the three black dots in his eyes swirled and swiftly pooled together in the form of a pinwheel amidst the crimson. When silence answered that question, he added, "—before I decide to find out for myself."

Mangekyo.

Reika stared at him, wide-eyed, terror whitening her face, though only a cold, hard look filled her gaze. Her throat was so tight with fear she could barely swallow.

"You wouldn't dare," she turned her gaze challengingly up to him.

But he had made his move before she could blink.

OoOoOoOo

The light drained away, leaving barely enough for shadows. The darkness came and settled over everything in the forest like a thick blanket. Panic flared inside her. Even the stars and moon cowered behind a dense layer of cloud, giving the air that tincture commonly associated with the world before a storm. The sense of sudden weightlessness, of flight, was almost terrifying. Her mind seemed to grow more paranoid—her ears sharper—every snap of a twig suddenly a predator. Every rustle of the leaves foretold of danger.

"Daddy?" Reika whispered, trying to see through the pitch-blackness.

Her stomach clenched when she heard in respond—rather than her father's voice—the sound of chains. They made quiet squeaking sounds as if they were being swung back and forth.

Then before her eyes the darkness transformed into a playground which looked to have been replaced with something sinister. The swings like gallows. Orange spots of rust peppered the long chains, the smooth wooden seats were rough, split and warped—quite unlike they were back in the village. They each hung heavily from sagging wooden frames and swung gently in the breeze, creaking. The faded paints were peeling off in curls probably from soaking in icy droplets. The relentless freeze-thaw tended to eventually take a toll.

When it suddenly dawned on her exactly what Sasuke was doing, razor-sharp pain and fear streaked through her. He was in her head and it felt as if her lungs were slowly filling with water, as if there was just less space in them for the air. Inflating them felt like pushing up a lead weight on her chest.

"This isn't funny daddy," she breathed roughly. "I'm telling mommy."

Her muscles were frozen in place but filled with such a tingling pressure she wanted to run until her body was empty. Her heart could beat all it wanted however, her body wouldn't move.

" _Your mother is a traitor!"_ mirthless laughter rang through the air.

She flinched as the memory echoed through her mind. She couldn't stop her small hands from curling into fists by her sides. "Get out of my head, daddy!"

" _And she married a traitor whose only use for her is an incubator!"_

Reika wanted to throw her hands over her ears and block out the voices. But she couldn't move even an iota. She wanted to run, but something held her where she was—held her while everything inside her mind rejected the memories and the emotions that were being stirred up.

" _Your father has terrible taste in women. If it wasn't for his genes you probably would've looked like an oversized mouse. Like your mother."_

She didn't want to remember. She closed her eyes, trying to hold back the tears as the memories began to rip through her. Violent, filled with her screams and mocking laughter.

" _It's only a matter of time before your father abandons the whole lot of you."_

"Stop it daddy," she pled and realized then that tears wet her cheeks, dripped off her chin. Sobs were ripping inside her chest as she fought to hold them back.

" _How can you truly be an Uchiha without the Sharingan?"_

"Get out of my head," she screamed with rage and fear, until her voice cracked.

Her heart pounded with hard, driving beats within her chest. It was her worst nightmare come to life. Again.

The taunts, they haunted her in her sleep, in her consciousness and the sub-universe between. They shadowed what she knew to be true and coloured it with skepticism and uncertainty.

"Don't let it get to you," she ordered herself fiercely. "This isn't real."

She couldn't let him break her, couldn't let him see what had been bothering her all this while—what she had to endure every day.

Reika knew envy was the main reason behind the teasing—she was the top of her class and highly favoured—but she couldn't ignore them; she couldn't pretend as if some of the things said weren't coming into fruition.

" _I bet he intends to kill you and your mother and leave your younger brother—the one true Uchiha—to avenge your pitiful lives."_

"Get out—" she was shuddering with her sobs now, fighting to hold them back, to keep the pain inside, buried, where it could never hurt her again. "—get out of my head daddy."

" _Uchihas have an obsession with repeating history, you know? It's only a matter of time."_

"Please," she whimpered, shuddering as the tears fell faster.

" _Your mother is useless anyway; I suppose restoring your abominable clan is putting her to good use."_

"Daddy—" her breath hitched.

" _Your father is a psychopath who only ever loved his brother and he slaughtered him so just imagine what he'll do to you. Someone he doesn't even value."_

"—make it stop," she shook her head, weariness filling her voice.

" _Your family has caused this village enough pain. Do us all a favour and kill off each other. You know it's bound to happen."_

For the first time in her life, Uchiha Reika was terrified. It wasn't fear. It was soul destroying, mind-numbing, screaming terror.

"Get out of my head. Stop it daddy!" a blood-curdling shriek tore from her chest along with a sudden burst of energy.

It exploded around her and she felt the ground beneath her thinned—almost as if it wasn't there at all and she was floating in mid-air.

Blessedly she felt the hold on her body ease—as if the invisible hands that had been pinning her down finally relented—and she staggered forward, her mind spiralling.

She was on his knees when her eyes flew open—the irises had darkened further, the colour swirling, burning—and choked on the tears that clogged her throat as she fought to get her bearings and to clear her head.

Through the haze that was her vision she recognized the presence of a pair of black boots before her. The sight that greeted Reika when she raised her head cut the air from her lungs.

"Daddy?"

Her stomach cramped with pain, both from the blow she seemed to have sustained from that strange collision of chakra and the look her father was pinning her with.

"What the hell was that?" Sasuke demanded. The growl in his voice was a horrible thing to hear.

But even more horrible was having to see the blood that trickled from his nose and the eerie black eyes flashing with living rage at her.

"You kicked me out of your head and deactivated my Sharingan in the process of doing so. Where did you learn to do that?"

She blinked and felt herself shake from inside out.

Confused.

Frightened.

"Never mind what just happened," his eyes raked over her, his expression turning savage as he reached out, a single finger whispering over her cheek. "Is that what has been bothering you all this while?" his tone was harsher, colder and if possible, more sympathetic. "A couple snide remarks from some snot nose, little brats?"

"Do not touch me," she snarled, her fingers gripping his arm, nails biting into the black sleeves of the coat he wore. "You wouldn't understand."

He retracted his hand and straightened himself. "If you want something to fear that badly, fear your mother's wrath when she finds out about this."

He heard the tiny mewls, little squeaks of sound as her fists clenched and released. She wanted to cry, but she didn't have the strength. Perhaps he went a little overboard using genjutsu on her. But he knew her well enough to know what he wouldn't get anything out of her unless he forced her. She really was his personality clone.

"Please don't tell mommy," her voice was reed thin, hoarse. "I don't want her to know what's being said about her because it isn't true. I don't want to hurt—"

She heard the sudden angry hiss of indrawn breath a mere millisecond before his hard hands clamped down on her tiny shoulders, forcing her to look up at him as he grated blackly, "If you believed it wasn't true you wouldn't have felt the need to try and validate it with Naruto."

"—don't want to hurt her," she finished feebly. Her heart was beating with a heavy, sickly, guilty, rhythm. When his grip merely tightened she ground out quickly. "I was having a private discussion with the Hokage. How dare you eavesdrop?"

OoOoOoOo

His mouth went hard, "I could care less what you think of me. But those thoughts that you harbor about your mother, you need to get rid of them."

There was a kind of tightness in that deep raspy voice and had Reika not known better she would have imagined it to be pain. But she did know better, she reminded herself scornfully. He might not love her mother but he obviously thought she deserved respect simply because she was **his** wife.

Arrogant.

"Have I made myself clear?" his teeth closed with a snap.

She glared up at Sasuke. He tended to raise more questions than he provided answers. It would be pointless to expect anything from him besides more confusion.

His dropped his hands again, bunched them against his trousers. He looked as if he would like to shake her until her head dropped off, and she pushed the word "no" past her dry lips and saw his mouth go tight, the skin growing taut across his aggressively set jaw.

"I've come to terms with your feelings towards me," Reika exploded hotly.

He asked drily, "And what might that be?"

"Resentment," she said simply, shivering as she stepped back, feeling the cold wind that whipped around her, but knew the chill inside her came from much more than the weather. "—but my mother deserves better."

He stared back at her, shock winding through his system first before pure rage took over. "When I've given you reasons to doubt my relationship with your mother, only then will I try to redeem myself in your eyes—in that regard."

"You're using her."

"I'm what?" There was a note of surprise in his voice though his expression became more brooding. "If that was the case, I'd have far more spoilt brats like you to deal with."

She gave a small, sarcastic snort, "Far more spoilt brats to murder. The more the merrier, right? Uchihas like to kill in numbers, don't they?"

He lifted one straight black brow cynically. "So they say."

Reika's voice knotted with frustration as she raised her voice, "Can't you give a straight answer?"

His own voice was curtly precise when he responded, "Try asking a sane question and I might consider it."

She stomped her feet and growled low in her throat, "Daddy!"

"Reika," he returned tartly.

When her eyes locked with his narrowed gaze she turned her head quickly because what she had seen was compassion, pity. She couldn't handle that, couldn't handle being ridiculed.

The silence was long and burdened with tension.

"Have I been so demonized by your friends that you believe I would murder you and your mother in cold blood, simply for the sake of repeating history?"

She compressed her lips.

"Was that why you decided to leave the village?" as serious as his tone had been, Reika could swear she heard derisive laughter ringing inside her head as he spoke. "And if you were so concerned about Tenten's safety, why did you leave her behind?"

"Because mommy loves you too much," she howled. "She would never believe me. I thought that if I left and sought my own strength I could return and defeat you before you put your plan into motion."

"My plan?" he demanded rawly.

"You idolize uncle Itachi, don't you?"

Sasuke knew right away what she was implying. That he would butcher his entire family for the sake of following in his brother's footstep. Knowing her it was safe to assume Reika thought Sasuke would wait until Uchito was at an age where he understood what was going on, enough to want to seek revenge. So in her mind, it would buy her some time to gain enough power to come back and stop him before he massacred their family...?

He disregarded her throaty question—it had probably hit too closely to home—and his voice was terse with a still, devastating command as he bit out, "I've heard enough of this nonsense. Let's go home."

His statement hung in air, suspended by sheer disbelief, and Reika grated out, her nerves at screaming pitch, "I'm not going anywhere with you."

"Then who will protect your mother from me?" Sasuke queried contemptuously, and then went on to tell her, his narrowed eyes never moving from her anguished features. "I'm a psychopath aren't I? And according to you I only value your brother," his hard mouth curled cruelly. "So what's to stop me from snapping Tenten's neck now that she has produced an heir who can grow to become formidable enough to carry out my apparent death wish?"

And a death wish it had to be, because after Itachi he vowed to never bring harm to any family member ever—especially not a child. They would've to kill him first.

Shaking inside, Reika made the effort to gather herself together, stay calm. Now that she had heard it from her father himself, the notion seemed terribly ridiculous. "Do you find this funny?"

"No I don't," his voice had been so soft, so whisper-thin she had barely heard him. "I find it stupid."

She bit down on her lip for a moment before hurling, "The idea isn't so far-fetched when you think about it."

"It is," he retorted darkly.

"Taking your past into consideration, it really isn't," she told him crisply.

"Taking my past into consideration that is precisely why it is far-fetched," he had moved closer to her and the very forest trees seemed to hold their breath. Reika couldn't speak, her heart beating crazily, making her head spin. "Had I not valued or seen this family as a priority, I wouldn't have remained in a village that despised me—a village responsible for all that I've suffered and had to endure."

He had a point she agonized, looking up at him, the bones of his face tight with tension. "Then why did you stay back? Why not settle elsewhere with mommy? She would follow you to the depths of hell."

"Why?" he looked as if she had slapped him, and she didn't understand—her brain was too confused and tired to work anything out. "This is her home. I wouldn't dream of uprooting her from it because I was too cowardly to face my demons," he said with soft irony. "My sins are my own."

Reika summoned small smile, "I guess I should count myself lucky that my mother has more self-respect than to allow you to knock her up and abandon her for years without contact. For some reason it's not too hard imagining you doing something like that."

He flashed her a hard stare. "It's not simply a matter of your mother having self-respect—"

She blinked.

"—I respect her," He reached out and mussed the top of her hair a bit. His tone no longer tortured. "And that's not a word I use loosely."

The gesture didn't bring the usual smile from her.

"Do you love her daddy?" she asked softly. The question slipped past her lips, almost unbidden. "Do you love me?"

He tilted his head and stared back at her with a sense of understanding. Reika wanted to feel accepted—she wanted her mother to feel accepted—and sometimes, that was the last thing she felt. They both were members of the most resented Clan and without a Kekkei Genkai. Despised by many and thought to be talentless by some, more so in Reika's case, despite her prodigy status.

His expression hardened, became more stony than before.

She watched him now, trying to see beyond the calm expression. She should have questioned him more, she thought. But of all the pressing questions buzzing in her head, this was the most important—because this would solve everything. Reika didn't care for his past as long as he valued his present—their family.

"Of course I do," he said as though the words were torn from him, ripped from the very center of his being.

"Even though you're admitting to it, you aren't exactly saying it," she said painfully.

His lips tightened, the muscles at his jaw clenched furiously. "It makes very little difference," he stated.

"But it does, daddy."

He was such an enigma sometimes, and at others, she felt as though she had known him longer than she knew herself.

"You're my child and she is my wife," he growled. "A part of me and the other half of me. I don't lie to myself; I won't lie to you," he said. "So quit being stupid."

"You consider me a part of you even without the Sharingan?" she whispered then, staring up at him, her eyes dark, creased with pain.

"Reika," he knelt before her, his voice deepened as it speared through her heart. "You are me."

Emotion nearly overwhelmed her.

"Really daddy?" A tear dropped down her cheek, a silky track of pain that had his heart clenching. "Because all I've ever wanted was to be you."

He stilled, watching her quietly now, hearing the words, seeing the tears in her eyes as she blinked furiously. And hope and despair filled him in equal proportions. He wasn't someone he wanted his children to emulate but at the same time it was the most endearing sentiment—to know that despite everything his daughter still thought of him as a hero.

Her hero.

Her hands pressed against his chest, small fists thumping against it as rage flashed in her eyes. Rage directed at herself. "Oh daddy, it was that kid in the glasses, the one with the white hair—he got to me. He got inside my head. He showed me things—told me things. I didn't mean half of those things, daddy. I don't even know what I'm saying."

Kid with the glasses and white hair?

Suspicion and anger ripped through Sasuke as he stared back at her in disbelief. But he didn't give reign to it, he didn't want to frighten her. He would have to speak with Naruto and his wife when he got back. They needed to up Reika's security.

"Please forgive me daddy. I promise to be nicer to Uchito too."

Tears ran unchecked down her cheeks as he reached up slowly, his fingertips touching them hesitantly. She didn't flinch like she had in the recent weeks—as if he had repulsed her.

"It's okay," he whispered, lowering his lips to her forehead. "People could always get in my head when I was younger too. I guess it's partly why doing so to others comes so naturally to me."

Her eyes fluttered at the tinge of humour—she was so unused to it—as he smoothed the dampness away, her breath hitching as she stared back at him. Loved him. Understood him. "I'd prefer if you didn't mention any of this to mommy."

He studied her for at least half a minute before his frown turned into the first smile she'd seen on his face—and she had to admit. Her daddy had one hell of a warm smile.

"My thoughts exactly. I've been without a wife for almost a month now; if Tenten found out that I used Genjutsu on you, I'll continue to be without one for another month."

OoOoOoOo

In the dimly lit laboratory white coated scientists moved in choreographed silence as they drew pipettes of fluid from one tiny tube and transferred them to others. The rhythmic clattering machinery was like a soft whisper in the background. The scent was mostly of the setting agar plates but there was an undertone of bleach.

The sound of Kabuto's footsteps bounced off the black metallic roof above and the black metallic floor below—not loud enough to distract his peers who were transfixed by their experiments.

He passed by a couple tanks containing murky liquids and forms that were barely distinguishable. The glare from the fluorescent tube lighting suspended from steel rafters was nearly blinding. There were eight foot high steel cylinders of chemicals, mass spectrometers, particle accelerators, circuits boards and trays of assorted microchips a plenty about the place.

As he delved further into the high-tech facility, he came to a glass panel set in the wall and looked through it into the darkened room where a man with long dark hair sat in front of a machine that seemed to be sorting a set of test-tubes, rotating them, labeling them, counting them and finally delivering them into his hands.

Kabuto touched a button next to the panel and spoke, "I've collected the tissue samples from Uchiha Reika like you suggested."

"That won't be necessary Kabuto. We've already extracted cells from one of the clones we sent to Konoha," the voice was low and snarling almost. "My understanding is that they had a physical scuffle when he spoke ill of our dear Sasuke-kun. I see Reika has inherited his temper. I had to send the clone to repairs."

He adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose, "Permission to enter Orochimaru-sama? There has been some interesting development," he said in a controlled tone, deep down he was itching to get to work. To dissect her cell samples and know all that she was.

Uchiha Reika would make fine specimen.

"Why of course," the man looked up, golden eyes glinting ominously. "It's always a pleasure to hear how our new weapon is doing. She is growing rather lovely too," his unusually long tongue flicked across his lips. "Its ironic isn't it? The Weapon Mistress births the ultimate weapon."

A obnoxious buzzing sound filled the silence until a metal door to Kabuto's right reclined into the wall to allow him entrance into the room.

The temperature was significantly higher—roasting almost—but Kabuto supposed its hellish heat was fitting for the devil himself.

A few lights were on but like the stars in the night sky they did very little to lift the blackness, showing only the activity of the hardware—plasma screens of gigantic proportions with text that was too small to make sense of.

"I'm afraid that rare Sharingan you spoke of really does exist."

A sharp laugh left Orochimaru's lips but he was actually glaring. "Did you ever doubt me?"

Kabuto bowed his head in apology, "Of course not Orochimaru-sama. But without it having been fully activated as yet, she managed to kick Sasuke out of her head and forced his own Sharingan to recede."

"Interesting," he drawled, tapping a long finger against an empty beaker in deep thought. "Do they still think she is without the clan's Kekkei Genkai?"

He scratched his white head, "I think Sasuke is suspicious. He bled from the nose and was left a little winded after the altercation. The flare of chakra was immense. He may have brushed it aside but there is no way he wasn't the least bit curious."

Amber eyes watched him thoughtfully, thin lips quirked with a hint of knowing—sinister—amusement. "You know what this means don't you Kabuto-san?"

The man was quiet.

"We can't resort to playground tactics to try and lure the girl out of the village anymore."

Kabuto nodded.

"But we will need both siblings if we are to make a weapon out of the girl," he told him seriously. "It's a theory but her first kill could activate her Sharingan. Like I said, she has a more complicated kind that may require a little assistance." He laughed a cruel, inhuman and brutal sound. "But just imagine if that first kill was to be her precious younger brother? It would be like killing two birds with one stone. We could awaken the Mangekyo as well."

His companion's lips twitched.

"And who knows what else?" he grinned a grin that spoke of his soullessness and capability of nothing but survival and dark evil. "Perhaps the worst nightmare to have ever been unleashed on Konoha."

* * *

 **A/N: I'm so annoyed by the lack of SasuTen in this story so I might consider an epilogue (probably family fluff) but this was really supposed to be the last chapter, something to leave you wondering. Lmao no one figured out the relation of the kids names to Sasuke's and Tenten. It's pretty fucking dumb actually. R, S, T, U—their names all begin with sequenced letters of the alphabet. Anyways, I really have no idea what to think of this chapter lol. If you are interested in an epilogue feel free to leave me a review. They are always appreciated. Thanks for reading.**


	5. Epilogue

" **Happiness is only real when shared."**

— **Jon Krakauer**

By the time they got home, the moon had risen high, enveloping the city in a blanket of silver. It weaved in and out of the ribbons of black clouds scudding across the sky.

Sasuke scurried up the stone path towards the Uchiha main house. Fallen leaves littered the walkway that led to the front door, bathing it in dark red and orange. They made satisfyingly crunching noises beneath his boot.

Reika was fast asleep on his back, her head resting on his shoulder—nose burrowing into his neck, her steady breath tickling his skin.

The porch light was on, and the familiar yellow glow made the house feel warm and inviting. A new flower pot sat next to the door filled with red and white tulips—something he had ordered from Ino as a peace offering for Tenten.

Though she's not likely to admit to it, his wife was a sucker for those cliché gestures typically considered romantic—receiving flowers, tokens or chocolate. But Tenten would know better than to mistake it for such. Obviously it was an attempt to get on her good side since he did such a horrible job taking care of Reika and Uchito while she was away.

He wasn't even going to lie about it.

The metal of the doorknob was cool against his palm and Sasuke twisted it with ease, entering the well-lit living room. Its walls were hung with fine grey canvas and antique beams that gave the space a sense of the history that figured so prominently in elegant Uchiha style—even amidst the reticence pieces of futurism.

Tenten had the entire house remodeled but Sasuke had sought to keep some things exactly how it had been.

The decision in turn resulted in the perfect blend and balance of modern and old.

Gracefully turned-wood furnishings including a fainting lounge joined posh but soothing fabrics to increase the elegance. The windows were full paneled and hung from ceiling to floor. But the palette of dreamy cream and taupe with accents of blue and chocolate—a show of how well Sasuke and Tenten complemented each other—ensured that all was easy on the eye, an imperative for true elegance.

Beauty and warmth existed even underfoot in the wooden floor and carpeting―free of all the toys that previously lingered. Tenten must've tidied up a bit. She didn't like it when the house was in a mess.

As if she had sensed that they were finally home, Reika sighed and stirred in her sleep.

Home.

The word resonated in his head.

Even as he basked in the warmth of the physical manifestation of the word, Sasuke knew that he was at home in more ways than one.

Because home was also a state of mind.

"Where's mommy?" she enquired groggily, yawning as she raised her head from his shoulders and rubbed her eyes.

He set her down and listened.

The house was eerily still, which surprised Sasuke. He had expected Tenten to rush to the door the moment she felt their chakra signatures. Or at least be greeted by a furious Uchito who would stomp on his toes or kick him in the shin for letting his mother worry.

That damn boy.

He was even more protective and possessive of Tenten than Sasuke was. While he found it noble, it also meant that whenever the brat was around he couldn't touch his own wife without fear of being admonished.

Reika was no different.

Their worlds revolved around her—and by right it should, it wouldn't have existed without her—but the Uchiha in all three of them didn't want to acknowledge that, they only wanted to claim her.

And not share her.

It was discovered that selfishness wasn't a trait easily suppressed in their kind. No matter who supplied the other half of their DNA.

One thing was for certain though. Anyone daring enough to raise a finger to Tenten would have to answer to the entire family. And this new generation of Uchihas—much like their father—had a _'shoot first, ask questions later'_ policy when it came to the aforementioned Kunoichi.

"Ere ew are," Uchito huffed angrily.

He seemed to be coming from the direction of the dining room and his steps were purposely heavy as if he meant to intimidate Sasuke with the sound of his stomps.

"Here I am," Sasuke opened his arms in a gesture of defenselessness. "Why are you stepping as if your feet weigh a ton of bricks?"

"Ew a bad daddy. Ew make Eeka and mommy die," Uchito wagged an accusing finger at him, much like Tenten often did when her little Chito was being bad.

Reika's eyes widened in horror before she turned to Sasuke and buried her face into his side. "I made mommy cry," she sobbed, fisting a handful of his shirt in frustration. "I'm such a horrible person, daddy."

He smoothed her hair awkwardly. His hands were still—oddly—a little shaky from performing that Genjutsu and subsequently having it broken. "Tenten will get over it," he tried to reassure her, shooting Uchito an accusing glare.

He made a face and shrugged him off. "No she ill nut. Mommy mad."

"You have no idea how right you are about that," Sasuke remarked dryly, earning a defensive scowl from the brat.

After she had cried to her heart's content Reika turned to her brother. "Uchito," she choked his name with a tinge of despair and relief.

His little onyx eyes lit up at the sight of his unharmed sister, but he seemed to debate with himself whether to rush towards her or not. He had a habit of doing so whenever she came through the front door, even though he knew Reika wouldn't return his hugs or his enthusiasm to see her.

"Come here," she urged tenderly with her arms wide open. "Come on, I don't bite."

Uchito gave a horrified—probably surprised—little squeak. "Es ew do."

Even Sasuke goggled at her.

The guilt must be eating her, he thought grimly. She never did anything remotely friendly, especially not when it came to Uchito.

"I'm so sorry," she told him with unmistakable sincerity. "I didn't mean to hurt you, Chito. I swear."

The boy visibly shuddered before reaching up to touch his tiny fingers to the band-aid on his forehead. It was then that he seemed to make up his mind and remained rooted where he was.

He would not be felled by the tears in her eyes.

"Where's your mother?" Sasuke asked him with a snort.

For some reason it amused him to witness the tables being turned on Reika. She wouldn't have it easy. If anyone could hold a grudge, it was Uchito.

Reika's likeness to Tenten would be her only saving grace, Sasuke knew. He had a feeling that it was the reason for Uchito's fondness towards her in the first place. Heck, it was that very reason Sasuke himself put up her.

Surely he was never this difficult as a child?

"In the chicken with Rarooto," his small voice was heartbreakingly distant and soft. He wouldn't take his eyes off Reika, as if he expected her to pounce on him the moment he looked away. "Ink lady ere too."

Pink Lady?

Why was Sakura here?

Typical Naruto, Sasuke brooded. He always felt the need to include his wife in everything—including things neither her nor himself had any business in.

"Don't kill each other. Your mother doesn't like wearing black," was the warning he left Uchito and Reika before he stalked off towards the kitchen.

Like every room in the house, it was tailored to reflect the persons who resided within its walls. The kitchen was a unique combination of:

Concrete; hard and unwavering like the man of the house—the foundation of the clan to be rebuilt.

Metal; something so much a part of whom his wife was he wouldn't be surprised if she was made of it herself. Behind every strong man, there truly was a strong woman.

And wood, symbolic of all the things their coming together had crafted—the carving of memories, the shaping of realities and the creation of lives.

Uchito, Reika and whoever may come after.

If things went in Sasuke's favour, they would resume working on the 'whoever may come after' tonight.

Their love was multi-purpose like the element itself.

Combined, all three textures created a sleek and urban, yet nautical look. But Sasuke hadn't the time to get sentimental over something as trivial as the kitchen's decor.

He surprised himself by having broken down the types of material used in its construction in the first place then further analyzing it to find semblance of himself and Tenten in it. What was wrong with him? Had lack of sex reduced him to this?

This lovelorn (more like lust-lorn)—poet?

His face drew in a mask of concern, of desire. How he wanted her. His body ached with his need, both physical and emotional. It has been too long.

He would do something about that later. For the moment however, he could only focus on showing his two most unwelcomed guests out.

Somehow Naruto always managed to get Tenten angrier with him and Sakura did nothing to placate the brunette either. If anything she too only added fuel to the fire.

And Tenten's fiery temper was only not lethal when tried in the privacy of their bedroom. That kind of death he could wrestle with, revel in—was actually looking forward to.

But the other kind—

The one that entailed the torment of having to look but not touch her, for however long the duration of his probationary period lasted.

—would drive him to his grave.

His expression flickered with pain at the thought and had Sasuke spoken his voice would've been tortured so he cleared his throat loudly when he entered the kitchen.

Three heads snapped up at the sound, each face wearing a different kind of emotion.

For as long as he could remember, the kitchen was Tenten's favoured room to entertain her friends. She had just finish setting three glasses of ice, a pitcher of tea on the table and sat down across from Sakura when he stopped inside the doorway.

The room was just as spotless and bright as he left it earlier, the aroma gave way the presence of freshly baked cookies. It overpowered every other scent that lingered, permeating the air with a mélange of honey dew, chocolate and dabs of crackling nuts.

Baking.

It was Tenten's way of dealing with anxiety.

It was an odd past time for Konoha's Weapon Mistress, but since becoming a mother she grew rather fond of the craft. And since becoming a father, he too had begun to indulge himself in things that weren't typically Sasuke-like.

Things like chasing Uchito around the house while he pretended to be an S-ranked missing-nin. The six paths of Pain to be specific. Sasuke didn't understand the boy's fascination with the tale of Nagato. Wasn't idolizing criminals Reika's thing?

He was just grateful his son wasn't old enough to learn Jutsus yet, namely that of the Multi Shadow Clone. He didn't think their house would be able to recover as quickly as Konoha did after an unleashing of the Six Paths of Uchito. That damn child was destruction personified.

They would have their hands full trying to keep him in line, even more so because of the influence of their very uncultured Hokage. Uchito has already been asking what the _'Pepsi Justu'_ (sexy justu) was. The mental image of any Uchiha sneaking into bathhouses, painting the statues of the Hokages' faces and acting like an overall Uzumaki gave Sasuke a migraine.

Naruto and Sakura needed to have children of their own. And quickly too. He would not stand by and watch his precious boy be converted in the same way Konohamaru was. Coupled with the fact that Uchito was already too Tenten-like, Sasuke feared that having bits of Naruto tossed in the mix would damn the boy to a life of back-talking and stirring up mischief.

Isn't it ironic? Both his children sought role models in the two last candidates on his list.

Hyuuga Neji and Uzumaki Naruto.

Arguably Neji was a fine choice but Sasuke disapproved of him for two reasons.

1\. He was a Hyuuga.

2\. Tenten.

He could probably add Reika to the list now. Damn it. What was it with Neji and Uchiha women? Sasuke wondered.

Yes. Uchiha women.

It may not be in blood but Tenten was an Uchiha and that fact wouldn't change. She was Uchiha since the first day he had set eyes on her.

"Where is Reika?" She was the first to speak, rising to her feet so swiftly that her chair toppled to the ground behind her. "Where's she?"

Her voice was so pitched with panic it was a miracle she didn't break any nearby glass with it.

"She's in the—" before he could utter another word Tenten bolted pass him with whoosh of damp hair trailing behind her.

It was all curly and wet, reminiscent of a wild wind after a summer thunderstorm, untamed and earthy. She must've just taken a shower and came down to make herself something to eat.

He noted that something was on the stove and wondered if perhaps Uchito had gone blabbing about the cake they had for dinner earlier. Sasuke didn't miss the death glare Tenten had flashed him before exiting the room. But he put it down to the situation with their daughter.

Uchito would never sell him out—not in a million years, he reasoned smugly with himself.

Unless the opposition was his mother, a voice grimly reminded him.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. Why must everyone in their family always side with her? Himself included.

"Have you cleared the air with Reika?" Naruto asked between noisy slurps. He had obviously wasted no time mooching ramen off Tenten. "She was pretty upset when I spoke to her."

Sasuke's shoulders squared in annoyance and he turned on the man with narrowed eyes. "What are you doing here?"

"Someone had to convince your wife to come back home," he said with a heavy sigh. "I found her just outside the village in her Anbu gear, getting ready to join the search party—"

A black brow lifted at that admission.

"—and even after I called it off, explaining that Reika was found, Tenten refused to return. I had my shadow clones drag her here," he smothered his laughter.

Sasuke crossed his arm over his chest. He did not find that the least bit humorous. If he found a scratch on his wife that implied brute force had been used to restrain her, then Hokage or not he would let Naruto have a sample of his left hook.

"Why are you frowning like that?" he blinked.

He drew in a deep, hard breath. "I told her to stay home with Uchito. She hadn't taken him along with her, had she?"

Those two were always inseparable after Tenten returned from a lengthy mission. But after a few days Uchito would return to daddy-stalking and Reika would replace him at their mother's hip. It was a never ending cycle—one that barred Sasuke from ever being joined at the hips with his wife. (Albeit in a different and not-so-innocent way.)

"No, she had asked me to watch the baby," Sakura explained, her mouth turned down. "I told her she needed to take rest but she wouldn't listen to me." Her voice grew a little grave when she supplied that, "There was a reason she had been pulled from the mission and forced to return early."

"Why is that?" he regarded the medic curiously.

He had not expected Tenten home so early. But with everything that had been going on, it slipped him to enquire why that was.

"Ask her yourself," Naruto suggested, raising the bowl to his head.

He emptied the content down his throat with loud gulps. Then he set the utensil aside and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. All the while, Sasuke and Sakura gaped at him.

Really, there was nothing wrong with his appreciative appetite. But it bothered Sakura that it was for another woman's cooking and it made Sasuke homicidal that that other woman was his wife.

"It's not in our place to meddle," Naruto finished with burp.

"And yet you do it either way," Sasuke's voice was non-confrontational, but the flush along his cheekbones warned of a coming storm. He needed answers. "So just spill the beans. It's not like you aren't bound to."

For a moment—a very brief, infuriating moment—satisfaction glittered in those blue eyes, until he saw Sasuke's brows snap into a frown. "It's nothing to worry about."

He suddenly stiffened, lowering his voice. "Did you tell her anything about your encounter with Reika in the forest?"

"Of course not," Naruto said softly. "That would absolutely crush Tenten. It's one thing to be undervalued by a stranger. It's another to hear your own child reiterate those chilling sentiments."

"I know," his fists clenched.

He knew Reika was desperate to make up for the hurtful things she had said about her mother but the mere fact that she had internalized and believed such nonsense had made him furious—outraged.

"I almost lost my cool with her back there," he admitted, surprised by the guttural sound of his voice, the harsh unbidden pain that echoed in it.

He held Tenten in too high a regard for Reika to even question her importance to him. As a child, his father had always taught him that the greatest thing a father could do for his children was to respect the woman who gave birth to them.

Tenten had his respect.

His heart.

His everything.

She was his everything.

How had that fact slipped their daughter?

Naruto's eyes widened. He had borne witness to Sasuke's 'loss of cool' on a number of occasions and knew it to be a rather painful experience.

"What did you do?" he asked carefully, barely stilling the tremble in his voice. "Sasuke?"

There was a brief silence, as though he was weighing his words.

"She wouldn't talk to me so I went inside her head," he made it sound as if entering the mind of a child was the most normal course of action to take when regular interrogation failed.

A startled gasp escaped Sakura. She didn't know why she was even surprised.

The person in question was after all, Sasuke.

"I saw something in there," he told them. His eyes were bleak, filled with his own despair. "I saw a pair Sharingans."

"A manifestation of what she desires most," Sakura cut in casually. "It's common to come across things like that when you're inside someone's head," she argued with a tinge of condemnation. "I can't believe you did that."

He shrugged her off rudely and kept on staring gravely at Naruto. "They appeared right before she broke my Genjutsu."

"Wait a minute. Reika isn't even a Genin yet, how did she manage to do that?"

"That's beside the point," Sasuke rasped impatiently. "We need to discuss her security detail."

"Sasuke, what is going on?" Naruto demanded fretfully. Reika was his God daughter after all.

He had reacted quicker than Sasuke had to the news that she ran away.

There was another long pause, until he spoke—his face was dark and serious. "I think Orochimaru is after her eyes."

"What? Why would he be?" Sakura choked. "Reika won't possess—"

"She will. She already does," Sasuke said grimly. He paused as if he wanted to say more, but then turned away from her, dropping his arms in irritation.

They both stared at him.

Dumbfounded.

"You don't look pleased," one of them finally choked up. Sasuke didn't know who. He was too caught up running over everything that happened in his head to make the distinction.

"Something's terribly off with the eyes I saw," he said.

"What do you mean? Did they appear defective in any way?" Sakura watched him from above the rim of her cup. "If that's the case we may have to prevent her from using—"

"—quite the opposite," he told her on the contrary but offered nothing further. He couldn't even if he wanted to because he wasn't sure what to make of anything.

"What about those kids she kept on mentioning?" Naruto asked and did not miss the way Sasuke's eyes darted swiftly to the archway as soon as the presence of another joined them.

Fortunately it was only Uchito.

"Daddy, Eeka make mommy die and eave," he sobbed, rushing to his side. "Go make her not die!"

Sasuke sighed and shook his head as though causing trouble was no more than he had expected of Reika at this point. Hadn't they both agreed that neither of them would trouble Tenten with the details of what happened?

"Her description of one boy matched Kabuto's," he explained. "I'm certain the snake is involved."

Naruto clasped his hands together on the table. "In which case we really do need to discuss her security details," he hardened his eyes to a crystalline blue. "There's no telling what Orochimaru is up to."

"He doesn't scare me."

"Of course not. Only Tenten seems to," he joked but there was absolutely no a trace of humour on his face "By the way, are you planning to fill her in on this? Ignorance is bliss they say."

Sasuke's mouth thinned. "I don't keep secrets from her—" the way his voice seemed to tether out into the silence begged to defer.

Sakura's smirk was knowing and sinister—spiteful almost. Her emerald eyes were fixed with a determined light.

"—not when it involves the children," he added.

Added with the kind of cool a lesser man would not have possessed, had he been subjected to the kind of judgment Sasuke knew was being passed.

"Especially when it involves the children," she commented loosely, seemingly trying to correct his statement.

He knew precisely why that was.

That was a whole other can of worms. A can of worms that would (without a doubt) lead Tenten to make a widow of herself, should she be the one to open it and learn what he had done—against her will at that.

"You know that after a third child she is bound to give up Anbu and stay at home like you initially wanted," Sakura eyes narrowed to slits.

"It's for her own good. Uchito and Reika will need her at home now more than ever."

"You're forcing her career to an end." Her lips tightened in disgust, and briefly she closed her eyes. Even now the memory of how he had stormed into her office still scorched into her brain, and made her simmer with rage. Sasuke knew no boundaries when it came to Tenten. "I went against oath and breached doctor-patient confidentiality."

"You were doing your job," he said with icy politeness, and the eyes that met hers were hard and cold.

"You tricked Naruto into approving an operation only Tenten should have the right to decide to undergo," her voice was low but there was a tinge of something hysterical in it.

When her expression didn't lift, Sasuke's guilt mounted but he dismissed it. "This subject isn't up for discussion. You both played your roles and what's done is done," he clipped with a tone of finality.

The expression on his face was comical. From confident to wary and outraged in less than sixty seconds.

She gave him a wry smile. "I don't understand why a woman thought to be your prize doesn't have any say in—"

"A prize is a possession," he told her flatly.

"Mommy eave. You deaf?" Uchito tugged on his arm, reminding him of his presence. "Go hook fur mommy!"

"Calm down. Your mother is on the roof," he tilted his back and stared at the ceiling. Anything to avoid Naruto and Sakura's eyes. "She just needs to take a breather."

He stomped on his toes with each word. "Go. Make. Her. Not. Die. Now."

Sasuke glanced warily down and was a hairbreadth away from scolding the brat when something warm and moist began to ooze from his nose.

"Oh my God, you're bleeding," Sakura exclaimed.

"It's nothing."

"Daddy?" Uchito's little voice grew eerie and filled with concern, heartbreaking in its gentleness—in complete contrast to how it was seconds ago. "Are ew okay?"

Sasuke turned his back to him, cleared his throat and tried to speak—to assure him that everything was fine. As previously mentioned, he was every bit like his mother and hence slightly neurotic. Tenten had a tendency to make a fuss over the simplest of things. So did Uchito.

"Ink lady do um ting," he urged then.

Sasuke shook his head in protest when Sakura approached him and immediately regretted it. His head felt heavy and achy.

"You're scaring Uchito," she hissed softly, forcing him unto the island stool next to Naruto. "Let me take a look at that. What happened?"

"Reika happened." He caught her wrist just before her glowing hands came in contact with his face. "My wife will take care of that."

"Your wife isn't medic," Sakura reminded him tightly.

Instantly his expression shut down. No anger, no ire. Like a damned robot. Everything in his face seemed to tighten, to chill, causing her to shiver in reaction. She hated it when he did that.

"That's because her use isn't limited to how well she can control her chakra," he released her, as though he couldn't bear to touch her any longer. "I'm fine."

"Come on Teme, don't get so defensive," Naruto pouted. "Sakura-chan was only trying to help."

Sasuke grunted. "You can both help by leaving."

He needed to iron out whatever problems Reika had caused between herself, himself and Tenten. After all, a happy wife equated to having a happy life—and an actual sex life. Above all else, Sasuke knew he wouldn't sleep well if Tenten went to bed feeling the way he imagined any mother would, after hearing Reika's reasons for running away.

No sooner had Sakura awkwardly retracted her hand and stepped aside, had the said girl entered the kitchen.

"Daddy?" She raised a palm over her gaping mouth to muffle the sound of her horrified gasp.

"I'm fine," he waved her off, frowning. "What did you say to your mother?"

"Nothing," she avoided his eyes and muttered something beneath her breath before going to raid the drawers for paper towels. "Your nose was bleeding earlier too. Did you hit it somewhere?"

Sasuke growled.

Naruto and Sakura's gaze flashed warningly as if they expected him to bluntly tell the girl that it was all her fault.

"Chito, get me that jar with the onion slices, will ya?" Reika instructed, climbing unto Sasuke's lap.

He helped her up out of habit and scowled. "What do you need onions for?"

"Mommy is mad at me. So I'm taking care of you as a gesture of goodwill," she grinned.

"Ass-kissing Reika?" he teased. "I thought you were above that."

"You do it all the time," she wiped at his bloody nose and cringed when the tip of her finger was painted crimson by the mess. "I'm merely following your lead," she reasoned, a smile touching her lips.

It was warm and sweet.

And those brown eyes.

They were like hot chocolate on a cold night. The soft warmth within their depths wrapped around him like a blanket. They made him feel at home.

The fridge door slammed nosily shut—a few things rattled on the shelf inside it—and then Uchito was handing Reika the jar. She plucked a slice of onion out of it and held it to Sasuke's nose. In a matter of minutes the bleeding ceased.

Uchito clapped and squealed. "Eeka saved daddy!"

Naruto chuckled at his antics. "Where did you learn that?"

"The natural fumes of the onion helps to clot blood," Sakura pitched in. "You sure do know the remedies," she beamed at the girl. "Maybe one day you'll join me in the practice."

"I'd rather prevent injuries from occurring than having to patch them up—" The smile that she pasted on her face had little to do with warmth; it damned near caused frostbite. "—kind of like my mother does."

Sasuke smirked.

That was the Reika he knew and loved. Quick witted, sharp tongued and the commander in chief of Tenten's protection squad.

OoOoOoOo

"Mommy say no cookie!" Uchito cautioned later as he watched Sasuke deftly slide few cookies off the pan and unto a plate with a smatter of crumbs.

Their topmost layers were an incredible shade of amber—cracked on the surface, like the dry desert ground of Suna. The inside, he knew, wasn't dry at all.

"When have I ever listened to a word your mother says?" he snorted, thanking the heavens that the timer for the cookies had gone off after Sakura and Naruto left.

He wasn't feeling very hospitable and having to share Tenten's cookies would've crossed a line.

"Mommy say no cookie!"

Sasuke waved him off impatiently. Forbidden treats tasted better anyways. The satisfactory crunch that lingered in his ears after the first bite was a testament to that. His mouth flooded with delightful flavour and a kind of tasty thrill.

Once the crust was bitten pass, a silky, fragile intern broke free, a hidden secret revealed.

Molten and chocolate.

And indescribable pleasure swamped the taste-buds.

Tenten really did bake the best cookies.

"You're welcome to help yourself. Your sister already is," he nudged his head in Reika's direction.

She was already unto her third.

Itachi of her generation huh? Well she certainly didn't lack his enthusiasm for anything sweet. Sasuke smirked. It brought back memories of his brother and their childhood.

Uchito bit gently into his lip, seemingly warring between indulging or denying himself. "No. Ew get in tubble," he shook his dark head.

"Suit yourself."

The sound of a foot tapping furiously drew their eyes to the doorway. There stood Tenten with her arms crossed—her nose red, as were her eyes. But the golden flames of fury that specked her iris were ironically and unmistakably arctic.

"I hope you two plan on replacing the cookies you ate," she told them coolly. "They are for Hinata's tea party tomorrow."

Both Sasuke's and Reika's eyes were as immobile as the rest of their face, like it was impossible to process a command like that any faster.

Replace the cookies?

She had to be joking.

Neither one of them knew the first thing about baking. And why was she sharing **their** cookies with the enemy?

"I told ew," Uchito stuck his tongue out at. "Now ew in tubble."

The corners of Tenten's mouth regained their usual softness as she watched his little celebratory dance. Then she held out her arm to him, every part of her face in a brilliant smile.

"Come here Chito, your father and sister have cookies to re-bake," she hoisted him up on her hips and he kissed her on her forehead. "Let's go play a game."

Sasuke and Reika stared at each other in confusion. "What?"

"You heard me, Uchiha," her features were expressionless again, her voice distant and without much warmth. "I would say think of it as an opportunity to bond, but I fear if you two bond anymore you'll be Siamese twins."

It was sad to say but Sasuke and Reika really didn't know any better. They simply did as their egos dictate they should. If they wanted something, they took it. No questions asked.

Reika was five years old. What was Sasuke's excuse?

"Is everything alright?" he rose slowly to his feet and stood towering over her. "Why were you pulled from the mission?" He prompted, brushing a thumb across her cheek and felt the moisture there.

Her deep brown eyes clashed with black, and it took every ounce of willpower she possessed to hold his gaze as her traitorous heart pounded like a drum in her chest. She needed to remember that she was angry and hurt.

"No touch." Uchito slapped his hand away, glaring daggers. "Ew earth mommy's peelings."

"What did I do?" his forehead creased into a frown. "I wasn't the one who ran away."

Reika's head lifted at this but she averted her mother's eyes. "Thanks daddy, throw me under the bus," she grumbled.

Tenten flinched away, "I used honey for sweetening but a little brown sugar gives it colour," she told them. "Preheat the oven at 300°F and use the cookie-cutters to cut the dough."

Sasuke blinked at her, "Are you serious?"

"Damn right I am."

"Ham right!" Uchito echoed, turning to his father and sister. The superior expression on his face truly made him a replica of Sasuke. "Et to wherk."

Tenten caught his nose between her fingers and yanked at it, "You are awfully chatty tonight," she said with a note of suspicion. "What have you done and are trying to cover it up by acting cute?"

"Nut ting." He cupped her face in his tiny palms and grinned. "Me always toot."

Sasuke shook his head as the infant nuzzled Tenten's nose with his own. He knew Uchiha-guilt when he saw it—smelt it, and Uchito reeked of it.

"Always cute huh?" she asked. "I suppose you thought it was cute to bite all the tomatoes and shift them onto their good side so I wouldn't notice?"

Sasuke's shocked gasp and Uchito's nervy little chortle coincided.

"Pies!" he denied.

"Lies," Reika corrected. She had busied herself trying to rid her face of cookie crumbs.

"He did what?" Sasuke turned on Uchito, his nostrils flaring. "Well I hope a certain someone is hungry because he's going to sit in that highchair and eat every last one of them properly."

Uchito was horrified. "Hats not pair."

"Stop being ridiculous. There are at least a dozen and a half in there," Tenten argued.

"Not fair?" he asked quietly, his eyes were deadly serious as they fastened on the boy's flushed face. "We are not wasting any."

"It's high time you stopped getting this emotional over tomatoes." She rolled her eyes, and as she did so she became aware that Sasuke was looking down at them both, a dark frown on his face—although quite whom he was more displeased with she wasn't sure. "It's not like we can't afford to buy more."

"What was the need for him to sink his teeth in all of them?"

"I make sure em safe fur mommy," Uchito explained with a furrow of brows and a pout.

Sasuke arched a brow.

Taste-tester?

That was a new one.

Where did this kid get his material? Uchito was slick, he had to admit. For a moment he was even silenced by those words. But then his jaw tightened and a flash of annoyance darkened his eyes. He couldn't believe Tenten was gobbling that up. She had tears in her eyes.

"What a kiss-ass," he muttered.

"We learned from the best," Reika told him curtly.

"Awww, my brave and thoughtful little prince," Tenten snuggled Uchito closer and breathed in his wonderful baby scent. "You always make mommy feel special," she choked on the ache that lay heavy in her heart. "Thank you."

"No." He shook his head and eased back to look into her face. "Hove you."

The light touch of his palm on her cheeks and his adorable voice both conspired to make her heart leap in her chest. "I love you more," she kissed his tiny nose.

In the same way Sasuke could not deny Reika, was it Uchito's resemblance to him that made Tenten such a sucker for their youngest child?

No.

Her baby always knew what to say and exactly when to say it. And after listening to Reika's account of why she left, Tenten had truly felt inadequate. Both as a mother and as a shinobi, she realized and pain gripped her.

Exactly what kind of impression had she left on her children?

Not a good one if Reika thought she would marry a psychopath who would only use her to restore his clan. A clan he intended to wipe out? Because of an obsession with repeating history?

What. The. Fuck?

What kind of mother would put her children through that? What kind of woman tied herself to a man who didn't care about her?

She squeezed her eyes shut as the sharp stab of pain sliced through her again. What did Reika think of her? More importantly, what did she think of Sasuke?

She gave a little choked cry and Uchito's arms tightened fiercely around her neck. "No die. Ew bes mommy," his words warmed and reassured her.

"You break my heart every time you open your mouth," she laughed and willed the tears back, unsure why she was getting this emotional.

Tenten knew Reika had acted out of provocation. She had never once indicated that she truly believed any of the thoughts she expressed earlier. But that didn't stop them from hurting—didn't stop her from breaking into a thousand pieces.

"Once again you've proven how much of a sucker you are for this kid," Sasuke stared at her with narrowed eyes, his expression bordering on unreadable and bemusement.

Oh she knew. She goggled nonetheless, "What?"

"Last month he did the same thing because he claimed tomatoes would make him strong enough to protect you. This month it's another story. Can't you see you're being played?"

She giggled between sniffs, "At least there is some consistency in his reasoning," she said in Uchito's defense. "Your little princess ran away because she resented me and thought you were plotting to kill us."

"She doesn't resent you," he said tersely. He gave her no further response, just stood watching her.

She found his scrutiny disconcerting and twisted her mouth into a faintly sardonic quirk. "You two drive me so crazy I'm surprised she didn't suspect **I** was the one plotting to repeat the Uchiha massacre."

"Ew till me too?" Uchito's eyes widened on a startled gasp.

She chose to quell his doubts by employing his sister's logic, "Of course not, baby. I have to leave a survivor to avenge your father and sister."

Having caught unto to the joke, Sasuke snorted. Uchito on the other hand was terribly confused.

"A bench?" he scratched his head.

"Avenge," Tenten pronounced for him. "A-venge."

"Are you mad at me, mommy?" Reika asked then, her voice even, though she heard the worry in her tone.

Tenten could manage nothing more than a constrained smile in reply. Then she sunk her teeth into her lower lip until she tasted blood. She was determined not to reveal the bewildered heartache that tore into her as she looked at her daughter.

Silence thickened around them for long seconds.

"You're not obligated to love or defend me, Reika," she told her after a long while. Their brown gazes clashed for the first time since entering the kitchen. "That's what I do for you as the parent. And I'm so sorry if my being your mother hasn't granted you any favours."

Reika's lips parted in refutation but nothing came out.

She gave her a sad little smile. "I know how much not having the clan's Kekkei Genkai—or any clan's Kekkei Genkai for that matter—affects you." She struggled to make her voice work, "Believe me, I would claw my eyes out and give them to you if they were special and you wanted them."

Sasuke knew she would. Because surely this was the worst kind of sorrow a parent would ever have to endure. The sorrow of knowing your child felt inferior because of something he or she couldn't change about themselves.

Hyuuga was right, _"ultimately we are judged by what we cannot change."_

Except Sasuke did have the power to effect that change.

He eventually would've, once Reika was older—once she understood that possessing his particular pair of eyes would charge her with task of protecting their family. In the same way he had always done.

"You mean the world to me and that should've at least counted for something," Tenten's voice cracked again and she buried her face in Uchito's hair briefly.

He frowned disapprovingly at his sister. "Aye um ting!"

Sasuke lost track of the conversation but he knew he would have to fill Tenten on his latest discoveries. Knowing her, she was bound to feel distress rather than relief at the knowledge that Reika wielded a rare variation of the Sharingan, especially considering Orochimaru's involvement.

"I'm not mad at you. I'm glad you told me the truth," she declared after a composed breath, putting a hand to push a tangle of hair back from her face.

Sasuke's nerves prickled uneasily.

How much of the truth had she been told? If Tenten found out he had used Genjutsu on Reika, he would be roommates with Uchito for the rest of his life. He suppressed a shudder. (Uchito fought in his sleep and was an occasional bed-wetter)

Thankfully they wouldn't exactly be roommates. Being the opportunist that he was, Uchito would see it as an opening to sleep next to Tenten every night. He would pass it off as wanting to keep her company since his daddy was evicted. And like a fool, she would fall for it.

But Sasuke wasn't worried about that happening. His little girl would never sell him out, he reasoned. Not in a million years. She wasn't like her brother.

"You can't help how you feel, Reika—" Tenten was saying when he tuned into the discussion again. "—you can't help it anymore than I can alter genes." There was ghost of laughter in her voice.

She lowered her eyes to hide the betraying trace of tears. "Please don't feel that way, mommy."

"How I feel is irrelevant. I'm more concerned about your perception of Sasuke's character," she said in a low voice.

Reika's head came up and she gave Tenten a surprised stare which was puzzled and reproachful. "What?"

"Watch your tone," black eyes glinted at her.

"Your father's most painful memories linger in these walls," Tenten beat her hands together in frustration. "Do you think it's easy for him to live here? To remain in a village that tore his family apart—?"

Though Sasuke wanted to say something in Reika's defense, the anger that vibrated in Tenten's voice silenced him for a moment. He knew growing up without parents had influenced how strongly she felt about the injustice done to the Uchihas. But damn it, did she have to sound so shit-scary when she talked about it?

"—a village that led him to believe the dearest thing to him was the nothing but pure evil," she added almost reverently at the mere reference to Itachi.

Reika looked at her mother as she spoke and was quite sure she was still angry despite the mildness of her expression.

"Sasuke is here with us because we matter to him," her voice grew quivery and thick with emotion. "I am appalled that you would allow a few ignorant comments to make you think like that," she admonished stonily.

Uchito made a sound akin to a whimper.

Reika swallowed and said rather primly, "I thought this was about you. Why are you lecturing me about appreciating daddy?"

Tenten blinked.

"And you," she turned to Sasuke, frowning. "I judged you unfairly and your only concern was how I would hurt mommy by leaving. Think about yourselves for a change," she snapped. "I can't even apologize for hurting either of you because you both make it seem like your own feelings don't matter."

"Lower your voice," Sasuke warned bitingly. "What is your problem?"

In response Reika had hysterics. "I'm trying to say sorry!" she screamed.

"It's not me you should be apologizing to," Sasuke and Tenten told her in unison.

"—it's your mother," he added.

"—it's your father," she finished.

"This is what I am talking about," Reika muttered crossly and glared up at them. "You confuse me. Who do I apologize to when no one cares about their own feelings?"

There was another wash of silence until Tenten broke it with a crack of laughter. Laughter and comprehension.

"You apologize to no one. Come here sweetheart," she said, setting a protesting Uchito onto his feet.

"Ew bandon me, mommy," he grouched and tried to seek refuge in daddy's arms but Sasuke was having none of it. "Pretty peas," Uchito cajoled.

He scoffed. "If you know what's good for you, you'll get cracking at those tomatoes."

"We nut pens no more?"

"We were never friends," he said, laughing to himself as he watched Reika reluctantly make her way into Tenten's opened arms.

Silly girl.

The fact that she was aware her parents thought not of themselves, but of each other first should've been enough to put her doubts to rest.

If that wasn't a prime representation of what a _'selfless love'_ was, then such a thing did not exist.

"I'm so sorry mommy," Reika sobbed and slumped against Tenten, her tears fiercer and more scalding as she wept out her frustration with herself. "I never meant to make you feel bad. I love you more than anything else in this world. The kids—they said—they got inside my head," she choked.

But, gradually, the tearing sobs began to diminish and the burning in her throat to subside, leaving feelings she could not understand, let alone explain or justify in place of the grief and anger.

"I was confused. Daddy wasn't being very nice to me while you were away. I thought—I thought—"

"It's okay sweetie. You're not easily read but I understand you more than you know," Tenten soothed, the comforting rhythm of her heartbeat thrashed under Reika's cheek. "How do you think I put up with your father?" She smoothed out her hair and grimaced at how tangled it was.

"He wouldn't help me brush my hair," Reika complained, as if she had read Tenten's mind.

She sent Sasuke a questioning glare. "Uchiha?"

He smiled at her and she felt the charm of it like the unwanted stroke of a hand on her skin. "Yes, Uchiha?"

She couldn't fight the blush. "Go bake my damn cookies," she told him tautly, annoyed at her reaction

"Ham cookies!" Uchito piped from somewhere on the floor. Wherever he was, he had his mouth stuffed with something.

"You're soiling the boy's vocabulary," Sasuke straightened himself and Tenten couldn't help but stare.

Hard and toned.

And so filled with male grace that it took her breath every time she looked at him. "Chito doesn't know what he is saying."

"That doesn't make it okay," he told her sternly.

She watched as he moved to the cabinet and took down his coffee mug. His arm reached up, muscles bunching in his shoulders and back.

Tenten shivered, her hands itching to touch him, to feel the strength of motion beneath his flesh. It has been far too long, she brooded. Either absence truly did make the heart grow fonder or it made the body grow hungrier. Her reaction confirmed the latter.

Sasuke turned back to her, leaning against the counter and he regarded her quizzically. "Why are you back so soon?"

His face—

She gushed.

—arrogant with just a touch of the aristocratic in his straight nose and superior expression. And lips; full male lips with just a hint of a merciless curve. She licked her own and winked at him.

"Aren't you happy to see me?" she teased, still cooing and kissing Reika's head. "It's okay. I will personally see to it that those kids' parents are contacted."

Momma bear was in full effect.

Sasuke held up a hand, "That won't be necessary. I need to talk to you about that."

"Not now," Tenten got to her feet. "You have cookies to bake. Both of you," she gave Reika a friendly shove towards the refrigerator.

"Me too?" Uchito chirped. "Peas mommy."

"No. You'll only get in the way," Sasuke shooed him almost irritably.

"Whatever you want baby," Tenten told Uchito and turned to Reika. "You're in charge, princess."

The girl gave a delightful little squeak and scampered off.

Sasuke was taken aback. "In charge?"

"You listen to her more than she listens to you so I thought it made more sense," she shrugged and went about clearing the table, pausing to take in the scene unfolding before her.

Reika was rummaging through the fridge, stopping every once in a while to give Uchito instructions to fetch various items—as if she knew what she was doing. Herself and Sasuke avoided the kitchen like the plague. Uchito probably knew more about baking cookies than they collectively did. (He frequents the role of Tenten's kitchen assistant.)

She shook her head in amusement.

"I'm not baking cookies if it's for a Hyuuga," Sasuke's voice was low and husky. "I can't promise that I won't end up poisoning them. What's in this for me?"

Tenten felt the weight of her hair being pulled away from her neck, only to be replaced by the feel his lips against her bare skin. The warmth of them swept through her in a wave that had nearly destroyed her. She had to resettle the cup and saucer she held back unto the table. Her hands were no longer steady.

"What's in it for you?" she parroted with a slight stutter.

"Yes."

She shivered at his hard voice, so dark and wicked, so husky it seemed to vibrate from the very depths of his chest. It was rough and guttural and she couldn't halt the little shudder of pleasure that raced over her body.

"What kind of girl do you think I am, Uchiha?" she asked with some amount of hilarity. "I can't be bought with a few cookies."

"I bet you that you can—" he said softly, stroking her side. Then he drew her back against him, his lips caressing the side of her throat, "—with my cookies."

Her breath sobbed from her throat as she whispered his name. Her eyes were enormous—luminous with astonished pleasure at that slight touch. "Stop that. The kids are watching."

"You haven't told me why you were pulled from the mission," he said reprovingly.

She spun slowly, her face flushed with guilt. "I had a feeling something was wrong here—or was going to be wrong. I don't know. A mother's intuition, I guess," she said lamely. "It was just a bad feeling, so I faked being ill and came home."

"Well you weren't too far off," he chuckled, brushing her hair back from her face.

And as he bent towards her, she raised her mouth to his. His mouth was warm as it moved on hers, and gentle in a way she had not anticipated.

She pulled hastily away from him.

He looked at her for a long moment, "How did you get away with that? Wasn't there a medic on the squad?"

"Do nut tiss my mommy!" Uchito screamed angrily, got to his feet and stormed between them. He had gotten into a bag of flour and was tracking bits of it all over the place. "Ew nut my pen."

"Go away," Sasuke growled inwardly and was rewarded with a kick to his shin.

The damn kid watched them like a hawk. No wonder Reika had doubts. She rarely got to witness any show of affection between her parents because Uchito was such a little bully they had to be discreet about it.

"Why so jealous Chito?" Reika pulled him away and tickled his belly where it peeked out from his pajamas.

Chubby legs kicked as his laughter filled the room. "Top it Eeka!" he giggled. "Top it."

Grasping little fingers found her shirt, grabbed and held on tight as she leaned down and did something neither Sasuke nor Tenten anticipated. She brushed a kiss over Uchito's forehead.

"Daddies are supposed to kiss mommies, silly," she tried to explain. "That's how we know they aren't plotting to kill each other."

Tenten laughed out loud. "Was that an attempt at humour?" She could hardly breathe. "Your jokes are just as terrible as Sasuke's."

She grinned as if she had received a compliment. To Reika, however, being likened to Sasuke or Itachi was utmost flattery. She was rather proud of her lineage despite the fucked up history, so Tenten knew there had to be more to her bizarre actions.

"No. Daddy nut my pen no more." Uchito was a seething shade of red beneath his flour-smeared cheeks. "So daddy no tiss my mommy."

"Friends don't go around kissing friends' mothers or wives, so I guess we're really not friends," Sasuke confirmed.

Everyone else erupted with laughter but Uchito was mentally decapitating his father. "Nut punny!"

"Don't tease my baby," Tenten laughed her way to the sink where she set down the soiled utensils Naruto and Sakura had left behind. Her heart almost stopped. Uchito was simply too adorable.

"It is funny," Reika giggled. "You're so jealous. What happens when mommy has another baby?"

"Mommy no dare!" he bit out furiously. "Ham mommy baby!"

"Not for long," she taunted.

"Reika," Sasuke's eyes flashed in warning and she quickly folded her lips, nodding in understanding. "Sworn to secrecy remember?"

She nodded again, a look of apology in her brown eyes.

Fortunately the spray of water from the tap and the clinking of ceramic, metal and glass had drowned out the sound of their voices as Tenten did the dishes.

"Now," he inspected the various items Reika had set out before them and sighed. "How do you bake these things?"

"Pes-see-pee," Uchito offered, waving a large spoon excitedly in the air.

"Take your brother to the bathroom," Sasuke instructed distractedly. He was too engrossed in trying to distinguish between margarine and butter.

"Pes-see-pee."

"Go to the bathroom," he told him shortly and went ahead to deposit half a cup of _sifted sugar_ (handed to him by Uchito) in a large bowl. It was later joined by another half a cup of either margarine or butter that he had melted in the microwave. (He wasn't sure which it was, he just knew it had to be golden in colour.)

He creamed the two ingredients together and set the bowl aside, like he was accustomed to seeing Tenten do. What went next, Sasuke had no clue. He was never one to stick around much longer than it took to steal a tomato from the refrigerator and exit the kitchen. If he stuck around, Tenten would make a little helper out of him. And it was no secret that he couldn't say no to her.

"Come on Chito," Reika tried to usher the boy to the bathroom.

He fought her off. "No pee. Pes-see-pee," he articulated clearer, with another wave of the wooden spoon.

"What?"

"Pes-see-pee."

"He means recipe," Tenten dried her hands and turn her attention on them. Sasuke was glaring at a bottle of vanilla extract. "What did that bottle ever do to you?"

"Why can't we just buy ready-made cookies and send over there?" he complained. "This isn't fair."

"Quit whining Uchiha. You sound like Uchito."

Reika climbed onto the counter and sat next to the bowl, swinging her feet off the edges. "It says here you're to add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition," she read from a sheet of paper.

Tenten beamed proudly. Reika's reading was three levels above the one kids her age should be at. "I'll leave you both to it then," she said and left.

Had they not been baking cookies, Uchito would have trailed after her. He instead stayed behind and made a menace of himself fighting with Sasuke.

"Nut hike at!" he shook his head and kept on saying.

"Not like what?" Sasuke frowned.

"You really can't say no to mommy, can you?" Reika laughed, cracking the shell of an egg on the edge of the bowl and releasing the yolk from within. "I can't believe your baking cookies with me."

"Mommy boss!" Uchito told her.

"Keep quiet and hand me the flour," Sasuke bit out at him. His really short fuse had burnt out on the brat. "You don't know you mother like I do," he regarded Reika. "If Tenten doesn't get her own way, she'll throw a tantrum. Kind of like the way your brother does."

"Me boss too," they were both smugly informed by Tenten's little minion.

After the dough was complete, Sasuke allowed Reika to spoon it into a pastry bag with a medium size tube. "That's it," he praised.

"Et me do it," Uchito snatched the pastry bag from Reika and refused to give it back.

Sasuke had no other choice than to lightly butter the baking sheets and guide the brat so he'd squeeze at least two teaspoon of the dough out and an inch apart from each other.

"Mommy had said to use cookie cutters," Reika remembered, just as Sasuke closed the oven.

"These cookies are for Hyuugas," he reminded her laconically.

He didn't have to expound. She knew what that statement meant. Beggars weren't allowed the luxury of choice. And in this case, they were doing the Hyuugas a favour, which essentially made them beggars.

Twenty minutes later when they transferred the cookies from the baking sheets to the wire racks for cooling, Sasuke was not pleased.

They came out far better than he had hoped, considering whom the recipients were.

Tenten was not of the same opinion.

OoOoOoOo

"It turned out I really was sick after all," she told him with a brittle little laugh and a grimace as the cookie finally managed to snap in half beneath the pressure of her teeth.

They were more like salted pebbles than cookies. And it came as no surprise that Sasuke blamed Uchito for everything. Reika claimed he purposely sabotaged the cookies by handing them salt instead of sifted confectioner's sugar.

Tenten shook her head, her tongue still coiling at the unpleasant taste.

Typical Sasuke and Reika.

They were always pointing fingers.

She gave them props for presentation however. Uchihas truly were masters of illusions in every aspect. Because looking at the cookies one would never have expected them to be such an abomination to the taste buds.

It didn't take long for Tenten to take matters into her own hands and demonstrate to them how baking edibles was done. She gathered fresh ingredients, cutleries, utensils and the likes.

"Be careful with those eggs," she tried to warn Uchito above the noises from the electric mixer.

"Homesick?" Sasuke finally asked. He forgot they were having a conversation before his cookies had rendered her speechless—albeit not in a good way.

She tasked him with whisking the dry ingredients together; flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

It was easy enough. He couldn't ruin that, could he?

Tenten allowed the question to hang in the air while she used the mixer to beat sugar, butter, and corn syrup in a large bowl. When the texture became light and fluffy she added eggs and vanilla.

The mixer was on low when she finally answered.

"Pregnant."

The silence that followed her announced seemed to grow, thicken in some inexplicable and disturbing way, and it needed to be broken. It made her heart pound unevenly and set her suddenly racing towards panic. Thankfully Uchito broke it.

"Tenant?" he asked, gradually adding scoops of the flour mixture to the bowl. "Hats tenant?"

"That's enough baby," Tenten stopped him with a hand and stole a kiss, "Yes. Mommy is tenant."

Reika waited patiently with a jar of chocolate chip in one hand and a spoon in the other. "When is it going to be my turn, mommy?"

"Whenever you're ready," she was told with a heavy sigh.

Sasuke's reluctance to say anything on the subject or have any kind of reaction to the news bothered Tenten. She didn't bother to hide her feelings as his met her gaze. She let the hurt, as well as the disbelief, fill her eyes before deliberately turning her head away. To meet Uchito's gaze.

She almost sighed. He couldn't have understood what she meant, Tenten told herself. And yet he was more excited than she was.

It was probably the promise of cookies that was getting him this hyped up, she told herself.

She wasn't sure excitement was quite what she felt. Another nine months of being treated like the finest China did not appeal to her. Neither did getting fat.

The discovery had shocked her immensely, because the Kunoichi Seal (a form of contraception; Ninjutsu that prevents ovulation by erecting a barrier of non-exhaustible chakra in the Fallopian tube) was 99.99% effective.

It was close to impossible to fail.

Six months after Uchito was born, Tenten had the procedure done. The seal had always held true to its famed reputation.

Until now.

And according to the medic who examined her, there was no trace of the Kunoichi Seal.

It was rather peculiar.

Only a medic could remove it so it couldn't have worn out or broken on its own.

"Tenant?" Uchito repeated, savouring the word. "Baby?"

Tenten's eyes widened in surprise. He understood after all. "Yes. A baby."

His little mouth opened in a gape. "But ham mommy baby."

"You will always be mommy's baby," she swiped a finger in the spilled flour on the counter and tapped him on his nose. "Always."

"Okay."

Uchito's hearty agreement rang a little false to Sasuke. He knew every intonation of his voice, and he did not sound delighted.

"My turn," Reika reminded him.

He helped her up unto the counter once more so she could toss the chocolate chips in the bowl and fold them into the batter with her spoon.

"You know Chito," Tenten tried to steady her voice. Her eyes were on Sasuke but he wasn't looking at her. Neither was Reika, she realized. She suddenly felt cold. "Mommy's going to be home with you every day now."

"Es?" he answered with half his attention on what Reika was doing.

"Yes," she affirmed. "Your father made me promise that after our third child I would quit Anbu. It's partly why I got that seal—" she said to herself and as she did wheels were turning inside her head. "—so I could keep my career going a little longer."

Sasuke swallowed and decided to fake oblivion. "You remember that?"

"Of course I do. How can I forget when you remind me every opportunity you get?" she rolled the dough to a quarter of an inch thick after Reika was finished and handed her a couple cookie cutters. "Cut them out neatly."

"Me too?" Uchito asked hopefully.

"I don't see why not," she shrugged.

"Yay!" he squealed.

"He won't get them right," Sasuke objected, amazed how patient Reika was being with Uchito despite his rotten behaviour.

Tenten has spoilt that boy.

"Why should it matter?" she snapped. "I thought we weren't supposed to send our best?"

"These are Uchiha cookies, Tenten," his face hardened implacably. "They have to be on par with a certain standard. It'll sting the Hyuugas more if they are absolutely perfect."

She stared unblinkingly at him. This motherfucker, she mused. He was dead serious. "I'm surprised you didn't try your hands at politics, Uchiha. You contradict yourself a lot."

"Are you really going to have a baby, mommy?" Reika's brown eyes were alight with excitement.

Uchito jabbed the cookie cutter into the dough with unnecessary force. "No!"

Tenten stared at her daughter for a moment. She was smiling her usual charming smile, and yet there was something. She could hear the underlying strain in her voice—a kind of knowingness. Still she nodded.

"I guess Sakura is good for something huh, daddy?" the child turned to Sasuke. "Without her this wouldn't have been possible."

Shock and suspicion echoed along Tenten's body. "Sasuke?" she growled lowly. Her face was carved out of granite. "What is she talking about? What does she mean by that?"

"How would I know?" he snarled, glaring daggers at Reika.

"Ink lady make ew tenant," Uchito informed her peevishly, displeasure darkening his eyes to hollowed pits.

Someone was clearly not happy about this baby.

"Pink lady made me pregnant?" confusion etched across her face as she took up the tray of cookies. The ones Uchito had cut out were easily indentified. "What are you talking about?"

"Daddy and Eeka war evol," his mouth trembled.

"Daddy and Reika are evil?" Tenten translated, sliding the pan into the oven.

"Rarooto too."

"And Naruto too?" she frowned. "Chito, why are you saying all of this?"

His voice was almost a wail. "Inoichi seal!"

She stared in shock and outrage as the full import of his words sank in. Her face paled to a deathly white. It suddenly made sense now. "What about the seal?"

Uchito pointed at Sasuke and Reika. "Ink lady!"

"Sakura removed it? How? When? I didn't authorize that—" her voice tailed away as comprehension dawned on her. "Naruto did?" she whispered and figured. "Because he is the Hokage. But why?"

Tenten searched Sasuke's harshly controlled features as if she had never seen him before. He had power and influence—and he used it ruthlessly, looking down on lesser mortals like some pagan god.

She swallowed hard, "It was you," she was fed up and bristling with anger. "You did this."

His heavy-lidded eyes glinted with a calculating light.

She was trembling with a mixture of fury and astonishment at the lengths he went to just to have his own way. Sasuke had been bitching less about her being in Anbu so Tenten should have suspected something was up. But this—this was crossing a line.

"It was Reika's idea," he told her inanely.

The said girl flushed, turning her head away. Her shaking voice was thick with tears. "Please don't go back to them. You always come home hurt—"

"Don't give me that load of crap, Sasuke," Tenten eyed him with contempt. "This is all you. Reika isn't the one who wants me for a housewife."

"Sure she does," he cut her off with a bitter laugh. "We're very much alike in every regard—she and I."

"—what if one day you don't come back at all?" Reika finished.

Her eyes narrowed with tightly controlled anger. "How comes it's my career that has to get sabotaged? Sasuke's in Anbu too," she argued.

"Because this family will not risk you," his voice seemed to reach her from the far distance. "I am _The UnPrized Uchiha_ and hence expendable."

"Pair enuff," Uchito piped up.

They all laughed.

Because they all knew it couldn't be any further from the truth.

UnPrized or not, without Sasuke there was no Uchiha.

* * *

 **A/N: There you have it, a giant farewell chapter with clunks of fluff. I actually had fun writing this one, which is why it ran away from me like this. The word count almost gave me a heart attack. I didn't want to tie up all the loose ends (re: the Orochimaru and his plans) in the event someone should read this in future and want to adopt and expand on the idea. Thanks for reading, reviews are always appreciated :)**

 **Adios!**


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